


The Immortality Contagion

by innerurge1



Category: House M.D.
Genre: Alternate Universe - Vampire, F/M
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-10-09
Updated: 2019-03-28
Packaged: 2019-07-28 11:04:39
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 16
Words: 48,694
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16240325
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/innerurge1/pseuds/innerurge1
Summary: House gets caught in the middle of a fight to cure a disease as old as humanity. The Collation fears the knowledge of it's existence will soon be impossible to hide and fear the knowledge will causes a great war between two factions of infected as well as the rest of humanity.





	1. The Price Paid

**Author's Note:**

> This story all started as a conversation with my favorite beta, atavares. We thought it would be fun if Cameron were the older woman in an AU story. That led to lots of random ways that would work in alternate universes and vampire Cameron came up as one of them. 
> 
> And yes, who doesn't love the idea of vampire Cam? Seriously. It's hot.
> 
> But just writing a traditional vampire story—God vs Satan and the forces of good and evil, blah, blah—as House MD seemed a cheap win and very unHouseian. I mean, the show is all about science being superior to all else in House's life. I love that about him. I didn't want this to be an 'oh and now House finds out he's wrong and supernatural things go bump in the night,' because I don't believe that and, though I enjoy reading those things on occasion, it's not how I like to write House. But the idea was so hot, I couldn't leave it be.
> 
> What if it was all just some reasonable mutation or disease? Something that man believed could only be the devil until science proved it was just a disease. What would that revolation trigger? How would vampires use the information to adapt? Would they want to adapt at all? Would they want to treat it? Cure it?
> 
> For the shippers amongst you, this story is Cameron/House but it's also, in many, ways Stacy/House. I borrowed those dynamics because they work and because of how the story was birthed it couldn't be void of those two dynamics or the major angst surrounding both of them. So you'll be happy to know, House still comes out very House like in this universe. Though not an exact clone of canon. But you'd know him by his snark and his limp in either.
> 
> One more reminder — My life is insanely busy right now, so this is going to be a slow burn. If you don't think you can live with that, you know the way to the back button. But I've also never left a story unfinished, and I don't plan on starting now. 
> 
> Atavaras is also busy with cool new life things and now lives in a really different time zone, but she's agreed to make the attempt with me as well. So here's hoping we find the time! Thank you for giving it a go and if nothing else, thank you for the hours of work you put in like two years ago when we spent countless hours just brainstorming this thing. :)
> 
> And, though I haven't seen her around of late, thanks to like-waves-on-the-beach. Two years ago she was right in the thick of this too helping try to give me some credible medical information to base this 'science of vampires' on.
> 
> So, before we get started some things you should note. There will be quite a few triggers in this one. The list makes this story seem really violent and scary, but it's not a rape fest or anything so awful. But, as with many stories in this genre, these concepts and situations will be touched on with varying degrees of detail and I don't want to screw any of my readers over. This list might grow or shrink as a write. I'll do my best to warn you if new things are added.
> 
> As of right now, based on my current outline, we have or could possibly have:
> 
> Violent sex (consensual)  
> Non-con sex (more seduction based than clearly rape type)  
> Rape  
> Blood fetishes  
> Prostitution  
> Mind control  
> Child abuse  
> Lost of child  
> Persons unable to control violent urges cause them to hurt their loved ones  
> Drug abuse  
> Murder  
> Character death
> 
>  
> 
> Now I am going to stop calling them vampires.
> 
> Make sure to read the dates carefully, lest you get confused. There are multiple timeframes and settings swirling about.

 

### Princeton, New Jersey. August 15th, 2016

Gregory House awoke with a jolt, sitting straight up, his breaths coming fast and hard. Bright blue eyes snapped open and started to adjust to the dim light of the bedroom. His short chestnut hair curled from being wet with sweat which dripped down his chiseled face to the scruff of his three-days-unshaven cheeks. A sheen of perspiration covered his bare chest.

It was the same nightmare again. The one where his ex-girlfriend turned into a monster and nearly bit off his leg, feasting on his blood and flesh. Every night it's the same, and every time it felt completely real. The pain floods his leg as her bites turn from sexually charged play to something akin to a horror movie.

It didn't happen that way of course. It is an image his mind has conjured up to deal with the emotional wreckage. Symbolism generated by an extremely creative intellect. He had an infarction. She betrayed his trust and told the doctors to remove part of his leg while he was in a self-requested coma intended only for him to ride out the pain, but instead he woke up to this mangled piece of useless flesh one can barely still call a thigh.

And the pain. The never-ending, overwhelming pain. It has slowly been changing him, making him harder, and he wasn't exactly the nicest guy to start with. He hates it, but can't seem to stop the transformation. She left him because of it. After everything she did, she topped it off with abandonment.

 _Fucking bitch_ , he thought as he calmed himself yet again. Another night of fitful sleep to add to his life of pain and discomfort.  _You loved her. She betrayed you, ruined you. Now, who the hell would ever want you again?_

Reaching to the nightstand, he grabbed a prescription bottle of pills. Vicodin. His second best friend in the universe. The first, of course, was James Wilson, his only friend, and fellow doctor, who also made sure he stayed well supplied in prescription opiates.

 _For the pain, of course. It's just for the pain._  He wasn't dependent — wasn't an addict…

With that lie to himself, he lay back down and tried to find sleep again. He had two more hours before he had to get up for work. It was an exercise in futility that never worked. A half-hour later, once the pain faded to a level that could be tolerated, he rolled out of bed and hobbled to the bathroom to start the day.

 _No rest for the wicked,_ he thought as the hot water showered over him.

 

 

### Atlanta, Georgia. June 30th, 2011

A smartly dressed Stacy Miller walked into the office of Atlanta Field Commander, Jonathan Winters. A short, rotund man, with thinning blond hair and the appearance of someone in his late fifties, wearing a brown suit that belonged in 1980, stood up from behind his desk, extended her his hand and, once they exchange a handshake, motioned for her to the seat opposite his desk.

She'd been working at the headquarters of The Coalition for the better part of ten years. Winters had been there since the beginning. She was still mesmerized by his aura with so much indigo always dominating it. She'd spoken to him many times in passing but this is the first time she'd been called in for assignment by him. That in and of itself meant this was something big.

They both sat and he picked up a file from atop a small stack and handed it to her. Taking it, she began to peruse the contents while he started the debriefing.

"His name is Dr. Gregory House and his specialty is infectious disease. He graduated top in his class from Johns Hopkins and, at 35, is already one of the most sought-after researchers in his field. He's polovica but has no knowledge of this or our people. He currently works for the University of Princeton in conjunction with their teaching hospital. From a professional perspective, he's a perfect candidate for our program."

She looked up from the file with a raised eyebrow, "I feel a caveat coming."

Winters nodded, "A big one. He is as volatile as he is brilliant. He cares little for authority and feels the rules don't apply to him. His I.Q. paired with the natural gifts of the half-breed make him a force, but at best, an unstable one. He has an addictive nature and his appetites for recreational drugs and sex are a concern for conversion. He's a fringe case, but he's too brilliant to dismiss. We need you to determine if he is worth the risk."

Flipping through the file, she came to his image. The most captivating blue eyes she'd ever seen stared up at her from the photo. He was not a what she'd call a pretty man by any stretch of the imagination, but his clean, sharp features possessed an undeniably sexy quality. And the eyes…  _his eyes alone must make most women, and a number of men, want to flock to his bed._  Even as she looked at them printed on paper, they stared back at her with an intensity that seemed to see into her soul.

"We are setting you up with a cover-job at the Law Firm of Campbell and Henderson. They handle all the legal matters for Princeton-Plainsboro Teaching Hospital. You'll be working on-site at the hospital as their dedicated legal advisor. Your contact there is the Dean of Medicine, Dr. Lisa Cuddy. She is a high ranking ne-prerojen within The Coalition, she'll brief you on everything you need to know about the hospital, her own experiences with Dr. House, and will make sure to get you face time with him. From there, it's up to you."

 

 

### Princeton, New Jersey. August 15th, 2016

Dr. Allison Cameron passed Gregory House nearly every morning as she exited the hospital after working the night-shift in the E.R. He was a tall man, every bit of six-foot-two, even taller in his worn Nike Air Shox. His dress was more typical of a rouge college professor than a doctor. It's a strange combination of casual and formal, always slightly disheveled, as if his genius couldn't be bothered with daily minutia of something like ironing. His thin frame, once graceful and athletic, now cursed with a heavy limp which forces him to use a cane to walk.

If her life were different, if she wasn't what she was, she would allow herself to want him. No. That isn't a fair statement, she can't help but want him. She has wanted him since she transferred here five years ago. Three years before Stacy nearly destroyed him.

No, if things were different, if she was who she pretended to be, if she weren't cursed with this disease, she would have pursued him from the start. She would pursue him now. Since the accident, she can feel his hatred for himself; his self-loathing. She knew she could fix him, but the price was too high and every time she sees him it breaks her just a little more.

House saw her approach and felt the all too familiar hunger. He shook his head,  _Maybe the whole thing with my thigh is just karma for my mind's infidelity._

Each day he sees her, he is taken aback by how graceful and ageless she seems. The stress of this job tends to take a physical toll on many of its practitioners, but she still could pass for 25, though she was 28 when she started here, fresh off her residency at the Mayo Clinic. He would never guess her to be 33 on looks alone, though her demeanor has always given away she is older than she appears.

The trauma of the past couple of years made him feel as if he has aged twenty years instead of two. Deep down he knew he doesn't look that different, but the simple act of taking a walk turned him from a roguishly handsome forty-year-old, into a figure of a broken old man. No longer a match for this fit and stunning beauty.

He noted of the shift in the colors of her aura as she looked up and met his eyes. Her normal combination which radiated with light and dark blues, violet and yellow-orange, quickly infused with clear reds. It was the same every time their eyes met. He knew if she could see such things, she'd find his own did the same as his mind drifted to images of her naked before him.

Every morning their eyes locked, and every morning when they did, it was like a bolt of electricity passed over them. He especially felt the heat, and he couldn't control the sensual imagery that flooded his mind. Him taking her, hard and fast in his office, or hers. Her legs wrapped around him as his seed spilled into her. He could literally feel the contractions of her vagina around his penis. Every morning he dealt with calming a semi-erection, at best. At worst, he gave in and went straight to the men's room to get a stall and jack off into the toilet.

Stacy had affected him like that on occasion, but with Cameron he had become void of control over his lustful thoughts. It was maddening and exhilarating.  _If I were only whole again, I'd pursue her now._  But since the infarction, his only recourse was self-release and frustration.

Cameron's daily fate was no better; a ride home driving east, the blinding morning sun flooding through her windshield most of the way, her body ached with the uncontrollable response to the imagery from their minds. She retreated to her dark bedroom, stripped, pulled her favorite toy from the bedside table drawer and fucked herself into oblivion with his name on her lips, wishing she'd never been cursed with this life — a life without hope of being loved in a normal way again, with a normal man.

Of course, she knew could have any number of her own kind, but they only serve to remind her of the one who cursed her with this life. It's not fair to lump them all in the same category, but it's how she felt nonetheless. Her one attempt with a  _normal man_  ended with a disastrous lapse in control. It was a hard lesson learned at a young age and she vowed to never repeat the same mistake twice. Especially not with Greg House.

 _Little good you turning him down did him anyway,_  she laments to herself again, remembering how he clearly wanted her as much as he wanted Stacy. He was  _polovica_ after all, a half-breed; cursed with a connection to those like her, like the father he doesn't know about.  _Prerojen,_ they called themselves—the reborn. He'd already paid the price for this connection and didn't even know it. And now, because of her desperate need to save him, carries a bond with her he doesn't know about or understand — doesn't know he's lucky to even be alive, or how close he came to becoming far worse than just alive.

She may never forgive Stacy, having yet to find forgiveness for her younger self's same error in judgment. She'd even tried to warn the younger prerojen off from the romantic entanglement, only to be accused of wanting House for herself. There was a truth to that, but it was a desire she has vowed never to act on again. Now Stacy understands far too well and is plagued with a guilt that will last a lifetime, and for their kind, this is the cruelest fate.


	2. Damage Control

 

### Princeton, New Jersey. July 4th, 2011

"Hey look, those kids signed the consent form, they were paid and, in the end, they all went home cured. I fail to see the problem." He whined as he adjusted the microscope and, after looking in the viewer, scrawled something legible only to himself on a yellow notepad.

Dr. Lisa Cuddy was not, in the least, buying what he was selling. She stared him down until he looked up at her with her hands planted firmly on either of her curvy hips. He made sure to raise his eyes slowly up her body, from her gray pencil skirt to her tight green sweater top lingering on where it clung to her shapely breasts. After a moment ogling the cleavage escaping from the extremely low neckline his eyes roamed up her long neck, which was flanked by long dark hair, past her chin, pausing on her full lips and, finally, meeting the ice-blue eyes that matched her aura. The slow leer was all part of the game, the little power dance they carefully choreographed each day.

She remained unfazed and didn't miss a beat. “They were your research students, House! Not test subjects. They were told they were signing up for a work-study with you, as lab technicians, not lab rats!” She huffed with a slightly nasal Jersey-jew accent. He'd always loved riling her, well before she'd become his boss. Since her recent promotion to Dean of Medicine the sparing had only become more fun.

His dark blue eyes sparkled with mirth as he donned a face of mock sincerity, “Don’t blame me for the failures of today’s education system. I just assume graduate students have mastered the skill of reading by the time they get that first degree. It was all there, plainly outlined in the contract. If you don’t believe me, you should talk to Parker. _She_ read it, asked me the right questions, and got the _other_ contract as a reward. _And,_ thanks to her _basic_ reading skills, played an integral part in the discovery of the cure. In fact, I’m thinking of offering her an internship.”

All true, which made the bait all the better. He loved his job. He loved figuring out what buttons to push with people. Everything was a puzzle to be solved or a prank to be pulled or, on his best days, both. Days like today.

Cuddy folded her arms across her chest and House enjoyed watching as they pushed together her breasts. Her comments snapback his focus on her face. "Well, one of the illiterate one's parents are huge donors, to both the University and the hospital, and they and their lawyers don't seem to agree with your assessment of the situation."

She gives him a cold stare when his eyes finally meet hers again. “My office. Two sharp. We have new legal for you to meet, you’ll need to work with her to fix this shit.”

“Can’t wait!" He perked up swinging his arm in front of his chest with enthusiasm he didn't feel. "I haven’t had it good and rough in my ass in a long time,” rubbed his hand together in an excited motion and wiggled his eyebrows at her as she turned to walk out.

“What, Wilson actually spending time with his wife now?” she shoots back over her shoulder, getting in the final word.

He loved his boss. Not in a fuck-her-and-father-her-children way, despite her lovely curves, he found that thought just wrong. No, it was more like how you love that one sibling who fights the best, except it's okay to ogle their boobs. Any other boss would fire his ass for sexual harassment, but she gave as good as she got and played it with a straight face. Took real glee in one-upping him, either with work or with wordplay.

They had bantered this way since '94 when they were lab partners freshman year at Michigan. He was excited to pick it back up two years ago when she called to recruit him, and to his great pleasure, she felt the same way. He’s been in work-heaven ever since. The outside eye would think she has no control over him, but she does, in fact, have his highest respect and he hers.

That's why she has a lawyer standing by to perform damage control on his wild schemes. She knows how effective he is, and what that means to the bottom line. House's rule-breaking nature brings a rock-star type of press to all his research. And that type of press brings in the big money. People like rule breakers at heart, especially when they follow it with success, which he always seems to do.

 

 

### Princeton, New Jersey. August 20th, 2016

A light rain began to fall as House rode his red and black chopper down the dark alley in search of the right door.

He had to do something. The impulses were overwhelming, becoming as intense as the pain. He needed a distraction from the pain and a release of tension built up over the last two years since the infarction.

The first six months had been a time to wallow in anger and self-pity; a time to lash out and push away everyone but Wilson. Especially _her_. He loved Stacy and she betrayed him, then she proved her love was really no love at all when she couldn't bear the blame and anger he rightfully projected on her. If she had stayed, he would have forgiven her eventually. If betrayal had been truly born of love, she would have stayed with the monster she created and worked to help him find his center again.

He couldn't bear the thought of fucking anyone at all for the first year. As he became used to being broken—used to the mangled sight of his right thigh and it's crippling effects—he decided it was best to hire a professional to scratch that itch for him. They get paid to fuck far worse, he was sure, and they don't even have to look his scar once he is flat on his back. It is a far cry from ideal, but there is only so much fucking of one's hand a man like Gregory House can take.

But now, even that's no longer enough. Passing Cameron every morning has taking its toll, but he refused to change his routine to avoid it, for those few seconds of eye contact were more intensely pleasurable than anything else in his wasted and wrecked life. In his mind they didn't have sex, they fucked—hard and wild, with abandon, and lust, with a need that presented like fire in their veins. He knew she felt it too. But she refused to act just as he did.

He’s known she was broken nearly since he's known her. He could sense things in some people. It was a gift he’d always had. An ability to see more detail in the world around him than most, and in the people around him. Some people, more than others. With her, the pain read like an open book.

After a particularly intense acid trip in college, his ‘sixth sense’ began to manifest itself visually as synesthesia, creating an aura of colors that seem to correspond to the personality and emotional state of the person. He found it a curse more than a gift; one that often compelled him to avoid close human contact.

It's why he was in a lab, rather than a regular practice. He enjoyed solving the puzzles medicine had to offer but didn't want to have to deal with most people any longer than it took to get his answers and move on. When he does connect, he doesn't do so lightly. It's rather frightening how dependent he can become. It's why he only had one friend. It's why he was still not over Stacy. It's why he couldn't push his current desire for Cameron to the side; he was addicted to the eye contact and the effect it had on him.

He knew fucking her would quiet the need building inside him. But even if she suddenly did an about-face and became willing, he refused to ruin her life by strapping her to a cripple. Because, in truth, he wanted more than just to fuck her.

One thing was for certain, without her, it was going to take something far more potent than his normal Saturday ride to calm the storm building inside of him.

If he was honest with himself, it’s not just Cameron. The girls he hired tried, and for a normal man, with normal needs, they would have been more than up to the task, but he wasn't a normal man with normal needs. Sometimes he needed to dominate and be dominated. He needed it rough and violent and raw. Stacy gave that to him. She was the first woman able to fully quench his thirst in that department. Sex with her could be slow and passionate, but when he needed to fuck and be fucked, she was strong and aggressive, at times nearly brutal, and he loved it. Loved not having to constantly hold back or having to be on guard from hurting his partner, scaring her away, or worse.

This night, he was upping the ante. He overheard a conversation in a bar about a place where he could pander to his needs. A place where women and men were well paid and well trained for a person like himself, a person who needs… more. More than to get off. More than some sort of contracted dom-sub-play-acting relationship with a safeword. A safeword defeats the whole purpose. He doesn't want it to be safe. It isn't about being kinky or giving over control, or being in full control. It's about the fight, the stronger the fight in the partner, the better; the closer to the edge, the better. In truth, it is something beyond the sex that drives it, but mixed with sex… It made him hard just to think about it.

His leg left him at a true disadvantage, but that's what the drugs were for. Vicodin to kill the pain, Viagra to fight the Vicodin off his dick, and he was quite okay if the whore ended up strong enough to pin him and take what she wanted. Tonight he needed to be fucked.

The rain started falling hard as he finally saw what he is looking for. Parking behind a dumpster, he shut off the motor and careful dismounted, grabbing his cane from its clip. Leaving his helmet on, simply to keep his head dry, he walked up to the old, green, metal door and rapped: three quick, two slow. A small slider in the door slid open then shut; he heard the bolt turn and the door creak open.

Without a word, he walked in. Two men, one tall and thin as a rail, the other of average height and rather obese, both with dark-red-dominated auras approached him from the shadows. "Arms out," the fat man ordered.

Taking off his helmet, he handed it to the taller, skinny man then did as he is told, holding his cane in his right hand as he spread out his arms. He was patted down by the fat man, and his pockets were robbed of his pills and his pocket knife. The fat man continued, “You can pick these up on the way out. The cane can go up to the waiting area, but it doesn’t go in back. You will leave it with Millie. You pay Millie upfront or you don't get to play. Any _tools_ you may need for your session will be provided by your date upon request and availability. If you have a request we can't fulfill today, talk to Millie. If it can be done, she'll find a way to provided it in a future session. She’ll show you the books and you can pick your date."

 House nodded in understanding.

 "If something goes too far in your session, do not run — well, I guess for you that's a given.”

They laughed at his expense and got a scowl in return. "Yeah yeah, make fun of the cripple."

They composed themselves and he continued, “If that happens, you get dressed, ring the bell. Someone will come in and assist you and you’ll be briefed. If you do try to leave us with a mess, you won’t like how we handle it. Just remember your fee covers the risk, so play by the rules and everyone stays happy. But rest assured, our employees are highly skilled. Accidents of this type are extremely rare, so don’t feel as if you need to hold back. Got it?”

“Yep.”

“Through the door to your right. Straight back to the desk, and Millie will get you all squared away.”

Millie looked up as he approached and peered at him over her readers. She reminded him of a cross between Kathy Bates and his Great-aunt Jo. A plump woman, late 60s with hair dyed raven-black. Her readers had a chain, which made her seem like she should be working at the public library rather than a back-alley whore house. Her aura was harder for him to read, only giving off a low hum of violet. He was instantly calmed by her presence.

“What can I call ya, honey?” she asked with a gravel voice, indicative of one who has smoked far too often, for far too long.

“Greg.”

“Well, Greg, have a seat," she said and indicated to the gray metal chair sitting opposite her old metal-gray desk that probably came from a corporate office of the 1950s. He handed her the card he'd received from his first visit in which he'd been escorted to another room for a blood and urine panel. She took it and flipped through a Rolodex.

Sitting, he pulled his chair up to better see the books on the desk. Three large picture albums sat before her. A few seconds later she pulled a card and smiled. “Well Greg, looks like you're all clean and ready to play. We have something for nearly every preference. I can help you narrow things down. What kinda date are you looking for?”

He smiled, knowing his panel would come up free of disease. “Female. Fair skinned; light freckling. Thin but well defined. Five-five to five-seven. Small breasts; great ass; longish hair—brunette. Blue, green or hazel eyes. Mid-twenties to mid-thirties.”

"Good. You know what you want. I like that." Grabbing the middle book she opens it toward the middle and flips a few pages before handing it over to him. "Our skinny brunette section. They are organized by age so I started you at the 25-year-olds. Physical/biological features are listed on the left panel Special skills are listed under the image. You'll notice a card or an empty slot under each image as well. Missing card means currently unavailable.

 "Once you find an available girl you like, pull the card  and hand it to me, I'll collect the fee and get you squared away. We pay our workers well and fairly so please do not tip. It creates problems. We don't like problems."

Nodding in understanding he got to work skimming over image after image of pretty young women. He needed a substitute for her. Maybe with the lights turned down low, he could trick his mind into believing it was her. Maybe when the drugs kicked in fully they would also aid his cause.

Millie lit up a long Virginia Slim and took the first of many long drags as House carefully examined each woman's photo. The information on each woman was comprehensive to say the least, listing everything from weight, hair and eye color, to things he'd never have thought to consider which read like a mini-medical history, it even went so far as to list blood type, which he supposed was a good thing to know if somehow the "too far" scenario the door men mentioned played out in to a first aid situation. As a doctor, he was impressed by the thoroughness. As a man, he was getting impatient as he dismissed woman after woman.

 Finally, after what seemed like an eternity of looking, he found one and he breathed a sigh of relief when he found her card still in the slot. A willing substitute for his fantasy. Taking her card out of the plastic window, he handed it to Millie. "Ronda. Great choice. She's deceptively strong. Black belt in jiu-jitsu. Do you have any special requests?"

“Such as?” he asks.

 “Bonds? Toys? Should she strap one on? Wear something special? Et cetera, et cetera.” She said with an even business tone and a roll of her hand. House liked her even more. She seemed to read his mind and let out a bit of a cackle.

He shook his head and answered her question. “Not this time. Just her.”

Millie nodded. Leaning forward she folded her hands and rested her forearms on the desk. "There are some crowd favorites in every room if you change your mind, or you can call. You are welcome to go over time, but an additional fee will be charged, so bear that in mind."

“Fair enough. Any other rules I need to know about?” He asked as Ronda walked up to stand beside Mille. He had no idea how she knew she'd been picked but he didn't ponder over the puzzle long as his eyes roamed her lithe naked form. She was damn near perfect, though her aura lacked the melancholy flares of dark blue that he often saw in Cameron's, the bright reds were every bit the match and were singing an alluring melody to his cock.

Millie smiled at his obviously approving look. "No, that would sort of defeat the purpose. " She smiles up at Ronda and smacks her playfully on the ass, which gets a wink from the younger woman. "Most of 'em work here because they like it that way. Despite what some may think, we aren't running a slave trade here. Our employees are here because they like getting paid to have rough sex and once you fuck one of them you'll know they can take care of themselves. Fuck 'er anyway you can manage, and she'll do the same to you. A better question is do you have any rules she needs to know about."

He felt his cock begin to fully awaken and he smirked. “Rules? No. I'm sure my prick will let it be known if things progress to scenario I'm not comfortable with. If I have raging boner go suddenly south, might be worth asking if we've gone somewhere we shouldn't. Otherwise, it's there to be used. And if she's not into something we're both better off if she just says so. I hate fake shit. Either we're compatible or not and, if not, I'd rather just pick another. I don't want fake just because I'm paying, otherwise, I'd have stuck with the garden variety prostitute."

Millie looked to Ronda who nodded back, then both looked back to House as he continued "I guess all that’s left is payment; how much do I owe you? I think two hours should suffice…" Ronda raised an eyebrow and he took it as the challenge it was. "No, you know what? Fuck it. I'll take the whole night."


	3. Tension and Release

### Princeton, New Jersey. July 4th, 2011

“You’re late.” Cuddy snapped at him before he was even through the door. 

“Hopefully that means you’ll spank me later, Mommy.” He quipped back with a grin and then looked down at the back of a person seated before Cuddy’s desk. She was a brunette, with straight, shoulder length hair which was lightly layered.  Standing, still with her back to him, he enjoyed the curve of her ass in her tailored suit pants. As she turned, he let his eyes wander up her body, appreciating each curve not hidden by her suit coat, then settled in on her deep brown eyes. 

Making a quick introduction, “Stacy Miller, Dr. Gregory House,” Cuddy motioned to the seat next to Stacy’s as House reached out to shake her extended hand. Her whole being radiated bright reds, yellows and oranges and he felt more vital the moment his hand touched hers.

They stood there, hands and eyes locked for a long moment, until Cuddy cleared her throat and bade them to sit. “Stacy is our new legal council. She’ll be working on-site full-time. Stacy, Dr. House is the guy that’s striving to single handedly keep Campbell and Henderson in business.”

“What are you doing later tonight?” He asked of Stacy. More or less ignoring Cuddy’s attempts to put them to work on his latest legal snafu. There was something about her that drew him in. He could see her pulse quicken and her cheeks became flushed at his simple inquiry.

Yet she answered with a perfectly calm voice, “Not sure. With the holiday, I figured I’d just wander around, maybe get dinner and a drink near the hotel—I just transferred here from Atlanta, and afterward, maybe start house hunting online.”

He interjected with a grin. “No need to look online, I’m right here. Since it’s Independence Day, maybe you’d be interested in  _ coming _ with me during some fireworks.”

“Don’t you mean coming with you  _ to _ some fireworks,” Stacy replied evenly, pretending to not be amused by his playful sexual harassment. 

He looked her in the eye with and answered seriously, “Nope.” The tone of his voice sent a wave of pure desire to Stacy’s core. She'd lived a sheltered existence for almost 30 years and was certainly considered off limits by the ne-prerojen she interacted with and forgotten how it felt to be openly desired and flirted with. 

Rolling her eyes at the obvious sexual tension in the room, Cuddy tried once more to rein him in. “Okay, House. It’s not going to help if our own legal counsel sues you for sexual harassment her first day.”

Finally turning to her, he pursed his lips mocking “Ah, Cuddy-wuddy, I’m sorry if you feel all left out. The girls are always welcome to come too. Then there really will be some big explosions, if ya know what I mean.” Turning back to Stacy, he gives an over exaggerated wink.

“It’s fine Lisa. He’s obviously just testing the waters. Besides, I  _ was _ kinda hoping to catch some fireworks tonight, maybe you and I could find a show. If Dr. House can promise to be a good boy, maybe he can come along too.” She teased back, her very slight southern drawl, which was generally well constrained, reared a little of its head as her banter become more playful.

He found it to be endearing, having been raised by a southern mother. He wondered what other things caused her accent to surface— _ maybe if I piss her off, or maybe if I lick her in just the right way. _

She raised an eyebrow at his lingering look and he could see a shift in the color of her aura as if she could sense his desire was sincere. He cracked a half smirk at the thought of making her aura burn hot white with her under him. “So long as I don’t  _ come _ alone, I’m game. Actually, you can see the local park’s show really well from my street. They block it off from traffic for the night and the residents have a big street party. You guys should come over for that. Lisa knows the address. You should take the bus, get off at 8th and walk the rest the way. Parking will be impossible anywhere near there tonight.”

And with that he walked away, leaving the two women alone in Cuddy’s office.

A few minutes later, House barged into  James Wilson’s office. “Our new legal counsel is a smoking hot babe. $200 says I have her coming on my sheets tonight. ”

“Not taking that bet sight unseen.” the handsome light-brown haired man answered back, without looking up from his work. Pulling out his phone, House searched for her name on Facebook and, upon finding her, sent her a friend request. Then he clicked on her profile image to open it full screen. “This is her.”

He handed his phone to his friend, who raised an eyebrow. “Deal.” 

  
  


### Princeton, New Jersey. August 21th, 2016

The morning sun peeked through the misaligned slats in the window of his bedroom. Reaching over to the bedside table, House picked up his prescription bottle, flipped open the lid and sucked back two pills. As he waited for them to perform their magic, he contemplated the night before.

He was sore all over. 

It was worth every penny. 

Ronda had spared him nothing. She didn’t even flinch at his leg and he, for first time since the infarction, forgot about it completely. When the Vicodin wore off, he was raw. His body riddled with bruises, scratches, hickeys and bite marks. His only regret was how the Vicodin had numbed him to the full experience. Perhaps he’d try a lower dosage next time. 

There would be a next time. 

However, this oh so well needed fuck-fest was not cheap and he needed to recover. It was at least a mental comfort to know he had this option. Perhaps a monthly rotation from his normal whores was all he needed.

He had picked well in Ronda. At a glance she was so very much like Cameron. With a little help from the opiates his mind could easily replace any differences and, by the peak of the high, his brain was well convinced. 

Then he’d really fucked her. Grabbed her by the hair, tossed her to the bed, and with a great amount of effort, thanks to her delicious fight, pinned her and drove into her like a mad man, biting and sucking and fucking her raw. Then she bit him and drew his blood and when he returned the favor she fucked him like a wild cat in heat. His dick, being hard from the Viagra, yet numbed from the Vicodin, was relentless. He missed the full pleasure without the Vicodin, but there were no regrets with what the degree of numbness allowed him to do. 

Glad it was Sunday, he enjoyed this rare lazy morning. Last night had even been blissfully free from his recurring nightmare. Maybe he was finally getting over Stacy. Maybe all he really needed was a good and violent fuck to set him back on track.

Conversely, it had been a long night for Cameron. 

His mind had called out to her during his activities and she'd allowed herself to be drawn in. It was almost as real as if she’d been there fucking him. Because in his mind, she was. She could feel his hands grab her with force enough to break a normal woman. Feel his mouth on her, licking and biting and driving her mad with lust.

She longed to trade places with his half-breed whore. To feel his cock rip into her with passion and need. Longed to throw him against a wall, to make him bleed while she fucked him to the brink. She wondered how his blood would taste. How the smell of iron would mix with the smell of their mingled sweat and come. 

His scent drove her wild in a way unlike anything she'd experienced. It ignited an inferno in the pit of her belly. The thought of having him raw and naked beneath her, knowing he wanted her to taste his essence as badly as she did his, was wearing on her long practiced resolve.

She needed to find her own release soon. She didn’t revel in it as he did, and her reasons, though similar, were far beyond simply being broken. But their needs were nearly the same. Paying a professional was by far the safest option. Grabbing her phone she texted a time and name to a familiar service. She had a favorite and he would give himself to her in all ways, under the safeguard of an escort. 

Tossing her phone to the side, she again cursed her life and went to bed. Come tonight, she’d at least find a moment of release. 

 

### Princeton, New Jersey. July 4th, 2011

Cuddy and Stacy left for House’s street at 6:00 pm. The sun was still bright so Stacy donned her dark shades and climbed onto the bus behind the dean, then took a seat beside her.

“He certainly does have a way with women.” Stacy comments to Cuddy. Stacy was pleasantly surprised as how well she got along with the Dean of Medicine. Ironic as it was, she didn’t always get along well with woman in authority. Or women in general, but occasionally one would connect with her and the friendship would latch on immediately. It was apparent that Lisa Cuddy was one of these rare women.

“You could call it that.” She laughed back. She has always adored bantering with House. It was challenging and she loved a challenge. He didn’t really mean half the things he said, but he reveled in the reactions he got from shocking people. He loved studying them and figuring out how they ticked. Even when the audience was beyond shock, he didn't let up because he had never nurtured another way of communicating. And because he was so very good—at everything—he got away with it. 

“So, do you two have a history?” Stacy asked, picking up on the way the two had bantered so comfortably. Though she was fairly certain, given the cool constant light blue of Cuddy's aura earlier that, if she had ever been with Greg House, she sure as hell didn't have any urges to repeat it.

“Yes, and no.” Cuddy smiles. “Yes, in that we’ve known each other since our freshman year of college. Had the same major. Ran with a similar party crowd. Had quite a few classes together and found we had a bit of a yin-yang thing as lab partners. It worked well for us to have to have the constant pushing and pulling toward a solution. No, in the way you are really asking about. We’ve never dated or slept together. House is just a work friend. We don’t often see one another outside the hospital. I think that neither of us wants to ruin the dynamic. It works for us.”

Looking over to Stacy, she raised an eyebrow. “So, any particular reason you’re asking? Maybe, you’re feeling a little charmed by his baby-blues?” She teased.

The young prerojen couldn’t really explain the overwhelming attraction she felt for him. It wasn’t just his eyes, though, certainly, they played a part. It was everything. His stature, his scent, his aura, his… everything. She’d been told by her mentor, before she had been converted, that she would need to avoid romantic relationships early on in her new life; that she should especially approach sex with ne-prerojen with extreme caution and in the beginning seek sexual release only with those of their kind. She was also told, in time, she would be experienced enough to consider it. After 28 years, she longed for more than just sex for the sake of release. Though, she is sure that even a casual affair would be amazing with Greg House.

_ Perhaps I’ve waited long enough or they never would have sent me on this assignment.  _ She mused. 

She’d always maintained the highest level of control. Even her insanely strict mentor, Professor Eric Forman, a convert as old as The Coalition itself, commended her for it. Extreme control had earned her the position of recruiter after a mere decade in the field.  _ If they had thought I couldn’t maintain control, they would have never sent me, knowing that, though it's not spoken as a requirement, with someone like House sex often plays a part in the process.  _

Her inner voice bantered back with itself,  _ Besides, it is far too early to assume it will end in more than a fling anyway. The file had made his sexual exploits quite clear. There’s nothing to indicate he’d want more than sex from you, not that you’d complain if that’s all he wants.  _ Stacy shook her head at herself.  _ You’re acting like a girl with a crush.  _ Then she smiled at the woman beside her and gave into human feelings she'd long since buried, “You have to admit, he radiates sex.”  

“Um. No. I do not.” Cuddy snorts and shakes her head. “But I am sure that he’d be more than happy to ‘show you his research’ later," she said with a lowered voice and waggled her eyebrows in a mocking way.

They both broke out laughing, just as the bus reached their stop. Standing, they walked up the aisle, out the door and hiked the remaining distance to Baker Street.

Seeing them approach, House put his his thumb and forefinger in his mouth and let out a loud whistle. Upon meeting their eyes, he raised his arm and motioned them over to where he, Wilson, and Wilson’s wife, Julie, were standing. The two women waded the crowd and joined the group. 

Each building along the block had tables set up in front of them with various drinks and food set out, a potluck of sorts, provided by the various residences. “What’s your poison, ladies?” House inquired, stepping behind one such table to serve as a makeshift bar tender. 

Looking over the various offerings of wine, beer, and an assortment of liquors, juices and drink mixes, Stacy answered, “I’ll have the Cab.” Cuddy followed with “I’ll have a gregtini.” 

“What’s in a gregtini?” Stacy inquired. Cuddy shrugged, then looked back to House.

“I could tell you, but then I’d have to kill you. You should skip the wine and give it a try. The gregtini was the best result from the many hours of my misspent youth. Lisa was around for most of the evolution.” He winks at Cuddy, and she rolls her eyes. 

With a smile, Stacy gives in. “Sold.” 

“Right choice.” House set about making the drinks, with flair, tossing bottles, juggling lemons and limes as he went, finally making them all turn their backs so he could add the secret ingredients. 

“Okay ladies. Your gregtinis.” He announced and, as they turned, he handed them each a plastic cup full of the concoction and Cuddy warned “It tastes harmless, but if you are a light-weight it  _ will _ knock you on your ass.”

“Thanks," House interjected. "You just ruined my plans on getting Stacy drunk and having my way with her. Geeze. There was a time you were a far better wingman.”

“Who says you need me drunk?” Stacy quipped back boldly. 

Wilson groaned, realizing he’d just lost the bet.  _ I should have known better.  _ He thought as he stepped up to introduce himself, since both House and Cuddy had neglected to do it themselves.

“James Wilson. I work in Oncology.” He extended a hand. “This is my wife, Julie.” He motioned to the thin blond woman dressed in jeans and a loosely flowing blue tank top standing beside them. Her aura oozed with disdain directed toward House and jealousy toward Cuddy. She was none too happy to be here, but she wore a bright smile as she was introduced.

Stacy took Wilson's hand and shook it firmly, then extended her hand to Julie. “Pleasure to meet you both.” 

The evening progressed pleasantly. House scrounged up some folding lawn chairs from the deep recesses of a storage closet and they all sat around laughing and sharing stories. They make small talk about Stacy's move here and walked down memory lane a few times speaking of Cuddy's and House's various escapades in undergraduate school. Wilson, shared every embarrassing story he could think of to try to salvage his bet. It was no use.  

As the sun set, they aligned their chairs due east, so they could see the show. Not being one to miss an opportunity, House made sure that he and Stacy ended up behind the others, and pushed his chair as close to hers as he could.

As the night sky began to light in a brilliant display of color, House placed his hand on Stacy’s knee and began a painfully slow, entirely delicious, journey up her leg.   
  



	4. In the Darkness

### In the darkness. At a time unknown.

A man lay in a small, confined space. He was cold. It was so dark eyes which could see in the dark of a new moon, saw nothing. He wondered for a moment if he was blind but then quickly realized there was simply no light.

Where was he?

How had he gotten here?

For that matter, who was he?

He struggled for breath. He struggled to remember. He hurt all over, yet he suspected he was better now than he had been when he was put wherever this is. Why couldn't he remember? Why couldn't he could get warm?

One thing he knew with certainty: he was starving.


	5. New Beginnings

 

* * *

## July 5th, 2011

### Someplace, Somewhere USA.

"It's that time again," the cheery tenor voice of Rex Donovan announced over speakerphone. "Got any special requests this time 'round?"

"I was thinking maybe car crash and cremation," Allison replies, curled up on the couch in her pajama pants and tank top, as she files her nails. Her blond is hair still wet from the shower.

"Ah, com'on, Allie. Where's your sense of creativity? Allison Simpson can die or disappear in a nearly infinite number of ways and you come up with car crash and cremation."

"You know I hate being called Allie." She rolls her eyes, despite his inability to see the gesture. "And keeping it simple is the best way to not draw attention to it. If I get eaten by a wild bear, or hit by a falling piano or whatever else your overactive mind comes up with, it's not going to be so easy to cover up."

"You underestimate my super hackery skills, and Jen's photo manipulation artistry." He boasts back playfully.

Sighing she holds her hand out and inspects her newly filed nails, "Just keep it simple, Rex. Don't forget we still have a fair amount of memory jogging to support the media coverage and the more believable the story, the better it sticks. We're not the Borg, yet, so the reprogramming of the human mind is still more art than science."

He chuckled at the Star Trek reference. It was always an easy win with him. "Hey, it won't be long now, nanobots are the next big thing, then I'll accept no party pooping from you. I'll have everythin' ready by Friday. Your new assignment briefing should be in your inbox. Hope it's better than this one's been."

She nodded to no one. "I'd be hard to be worse. Later, Rex."

"See, ya." He disconnects first, saving her the trouble of hitting end.

Tossing her nail file to the side, Allison picks up her laptop, lifts the lid and opens the secure document exchange. After a quick retina scan to confirm her identity, she opens the files that will prepare her for her next new life.

The past five years had been less than ideal. She hated the job, hated the city, hated the most the people and, generally, hated her life. She'd thought she was finished dealing with medicine, over dealing with cover-ups and overwriting memories or as the younger set like to call it 'memory jogging', so she requested a teaching position at a high school as a marker.

As a marker, she would send intel back to The Coalition about the best and brightest students and they would be  _marked_  for observation and possible recruitment as they ventured out into their adult lives.

All this life had done was serve to remind her of everything she'd never have. So, after only five years, she asked to go back to Damage Control. It was her true calling to tend to the injured. At least the short break had reaffirmed this for her. It seems, she just needed a vacation.

It was a position as senior attending physician for the night shift in the E.R. of Princeton-Plainsboro Teaching Hospital.  _Good._   _Thankfully it's working nights,_ she thought having grown tired of the extra effort that came with being a day dweller.

She enjoyed trauma work. It reminded her of how she got her start in medicine, all those years ago. "Cameron, huh?" She says aloud to herself, trying the new name on for size, then practices a couple of greetings

"Hi. I'm Dr. Allison Cameron. It's a pleasure to meet you."

"Dr. Cameron. You can call me Cameron."

_Beats the hell out of Simpson._ She thinks and decides she likes this new name. Perhaps it is a good omen of the days to come. She continues perusing the file, memorizing the details of her background.  _Well, at least they'd gone all out this time with winning credentials._  Cameron had graduated high school early, won a scholarship at 16 to study overseas at the University of Cambridge and stuck around to do her med-school there before returning to the U.S. to complete a residency at the Mayo Clinic. When she finished her first fellowship she had duel specialties in emergency medicine and immunology. All by the age of 28.

"Not bad." She says aloud. Glad to see they'd bothered to take into account both her actual areas of expertise. After five years of teaching, she was happy they didn't slap her with a research gig. As much as she had once loved discovering ways to overcome her people's natural limitations, she wanted, no  _needed_ , a faster pace and a way to somehow help not just the prerojen, but the broken in general. It had been far too long since she'd worked in a triage situation. She missed it. Had once felt it was her calling. It's how all this started, after all. A nice ten-year stint in an E.R. working damage control and programming seemed just what the doctor ordered.

* * *

### Princeton, New Jersey.

"You owe me $200 bucks, my friend. But then again, you know that." A completely disheveled and unshaven House smugly reminded Wilson as they entered the elevator on their way to their respective offices. Begrudgingly, the slightly shorter man, sighed and reached in into his back pocket to retrieve his wallet, grabbed the bills, and slapped them into House's outstretched hand.

As he did, he looked up, noting the days worth of scruff and a bright red mark on his friend's neck. "You need to shave and… Damn… Not even trying to hide that?" He pointed to the hickey. House noticed his aura, which was normally a rather beautiful balanced mix of bright colors, flickered briefly with hints of darkened shades of red and green.

If Wilson could see House in color, he'd see a smug shade of pink mixed in with the normal bright autumn hues House's projected. "Hell no. I'd go topless today to show them all off if I thought, for a minute, that Cuddy would actually let me get away with that one."

"All of them?" Wilson asked incredulously.

Exiting the elevator on their floor, House continued with a huge smile. "God, it was epic! My back is covered in scratch marks. I have at least ten hickies on my chest and the one on my neck. I think maybe it'd been awhile for her or somethin', cause she fucked me like a woman on a mission. Not that I'm complaining. And I can't remember the last time I had sex five times in one night. I haven't even been to sleep yet."

"Jesus!" Wilson raised his eyebrows and shook his head, half shocked, half amused.

"Trust me." House said with a waggle to his eyebrows and a slap to Wilson's shoulder, "Jesus had nothin' to do with it."

* * *

### Someplace, Somewhere USA.

Officially she was still Allison Simpson, but she'd already become Cameron in her mind. She liked this new name and was happy to say it or be called it and not be reminded of a cartoon, regardless of how funny it was.

Cameron suited her. She also decided that Cameron sounded like a brunette.

She'd gone blonde for her tenure as Ms. Simpson, biology teacher. It turned out to be a move that only seemed to make more of the adolescent boys, and a handful of girls, hot for teacher, but she liked to change things up for each new life and decided it probably wasn't as drastic a difference as she perceived it to be. However, she always felt she was treated with more respect in her native brunette.

So she called Rex and made sure he let the team know she'd be changing her hair color, so they'd have everything ready for Friday, then spent the evening packing up the few boxes of things she always took with her. A handful of trinkets from every era of her past. She kept them all out but tucked away in her attic room. It gave her easy access to enjoy them, still out of sight of the prying eyes of visitors. She'd found that makes things go smoother for those working the coverup. So when Allison Simpson was dead, those left behind will find her apartment as she'd lived in it.

She was used to leaving material possessions behind, but had made a custom of picking one thing from each  _life_  to take with her. Some small reminder of the stretch of years and the people she'd come to call friends. This assignment had produced fewer than normal, but she had people she cared for nonetheless.

Walking through her home, she studied everything carefully until something caught her eye. It was a metal-work art piece a young man named Shawn had given her two years ago. He wasn't the brightest biology student, but he was an exceptionally gifted welder and metalworker. She knew he'd only taken the more advanced biology offering because he'd had a crush on her. He tried so hard, and hung on her every word, so she pitied him, tutored him and made sure he'd at least earned a C for is efforts. At the end of the year, he'd given her this— a sculpture of a phoenix, made by his own hand.

It seemed the most appropriate symbol of these moments in her life. Time to burn away an old life and rise from the ashes a new woman yet again. Picking up the heavy piece, she carried it to her packing area on the couch and began wrapping it in newspaper to prepare it for it's journey. The next day Rex would send someone by to pick up the boxes and take them on to her new home in Princeton, New Jersey.

* * *

### Princeton, New Jersey.

House's eyes opened slowly as he awoke from his morning nap in the intensive care waiting area. They had the best couches for sleeping in the hospital, and the waiting area was divided into small rooms to give often terminal patients' loved ones more privacy. Frequently, he could be found there when work was slow, or he needed to sleep off the previous night's activities.

The sight he woke up to was a welcome one indeed.

His eyes were level with a pair of knees. He knew them well after last night, having taken plenty of time exploring every inch of the shapely, long legs to which they belonged. Legs which now, sadly, disappear under a skirt three inches above. Sitting up, he took in the full picture of Stacy with a lecherous grin plastered to his face.

"How the hell do you look so incredibly together today? You don't even look tired." It was actually a little disappointing for him, since he expected her to look as thoroughly tired and over sexed as he did.

"I don't need that much sleep. Apparently, you do." She chuckled, taking in his disheveled appearance and unshaven face. Though she loved him cleanly shaven the day before and, generally prefers the shaven look on men, she found the scruff suited him.

"I feel like my manhood has just been challenged. Lock that door and I'll see if I can make you look a little more thoroughly fucked."

"Down tiger, we have work to do, and all above the neck."

Standing, he stepped forward into her space with barely an inch between them, head bent forward, his lips nearly touching hers. "I do some of my best work all above the neck." Tilting his head to the side of hers, he leaned in and grazed her earlobe with a gentle bite, then whispered: "But you know that already."

He could feel her breath hitch, and see the clear reds of her aura intensify and begin to dominate. Taking her wrist gently in his hand, he felt her pulse quicken. "Sure you don't wanna lock the door?" He whispers hotly, his lips grazing her ear.

Stacy willed her heart to its natural resting pace. She hadn't been seduced by a ne-prerojen since she was one, even then, never like this. Since her conversion, sex was a need that was met in a very planned and controlled way. A necessary itch that needed to be scratched. In the real world, her kind played the role of seducer or aggressor.

But this man was like a strong, sexy cat, slowly closing in on its prey, seducing with its grace before striking with fierce passion. It is little wonder there was concern for converting him. And yet, he never seemed out of control: on the edge of it, but intensely aware of his actions and their effects.

Like the effect his actions were having on her.

Suddenly, she felt his mood shift from sexually charged to curious, confused even. His aura shifted away from pure clear reds to include hints of yellow and orange. "Hey, where are the hickies? I know you had at least two above the collar this morning. You're not wearing makeup on your neck." His thumb grazed over the curve of her neck, where he knows he had left his mark.

They'd disappeared just before she'd made it into work.  _Damn. I didn't think about that._ She scolded herself for being so stupid.  _Of course he'll have every mark he gives me memorised. He's a man of extreme detail._ Looking into his eyes, she raises a hand to his cheek and grazes over the fine scruff there.

For a moment, he could have sworn there was a glow to her eyes, just around the irises, but then again his synesthesia always seemed to flare up more when he was open emotionally, so he thought little of it as she spoke. "There weren't any marks on my neck. Remember, I asked you to make sure you only left them in work appropriate spots?" Maybe he just imagined leaving them. His eyes lose focus for a second, then he remembers: he'd only wished he could mark her there.

"Yeah, that's right." He answers back, eyes focusing in once more on hers.

"Come on, Dr. House. Let's go get some work done. We can play again later,  _if_  you're a good boy and we get our work done."

"You've seen me naked, made me come five times in one night, left my body riddled with sex marks, I am pretty sure that qualifies you to call me by my first name."

"Okay,  _Greg_. Let's get you out of this lawsuit, then later tonight I'll let you get me out of my lawyer's suit. Deal?"

"I like the way you think." He says and strolls out into the hall, leading the way to her office.


	6. Only a Dream

### Princeton, New Jersey. August 22nd, 2016

Cameron didn't pass him this morning.  _Might have the day off, or could be working over,_ he thinks to himself, disappointed as he always is, whenever their schedules fail to align.

He had dreamt of her the night before. Made love to her slowly at first, then again more aggressively, each marking one another, staking a claim on the other's flesh. At one point, he even dreamed he was her prostitute and she'd used him in deliciously kinky ways. Biting and sucking. Licking droplets of blood from his neck and chest where she'd bitten him.

He supposes it must be the byproduct of his previous night with Ronda.

He wishes it didn't have to just be a dream.

If he would only allow himself to have her, he could get back to enjoying her in other non-sexual ways. She's incredibly intelligent and a great doctor. Before the urges became so overwhelming, before the infarction, when he was committed to Stacy and had accepted that Cameron could only be a colleague, they had a budding friendship.

She'd taken an interest in his research and would stop by his lab occasionally when she worked the odd day shift or double. Her mind was as fast as his, and he'd rarely been around someone else he could say that about. Often he'd wished he could get her to work with him in his lab. But she has a thing for fixing broken people. He didn't get it, but then again, it's good that there are doctors who aren't like him or there'd be a lot more broken people in the world.

She'd tried to save his leg, but it was too late, the infarction had done too much damage, too much of the muscle had died. She did, at least, act fast enough to provide him with a chance to avoid amputation. Maybe if she could have followed him past the E.R. things would have turned out differently. Whether that theory could hold true is a moot point, but ever since she'd treated him that day, the whole dynamic shifted to the point that it is nearly impossible to be in the same room with her. If together too long, he's not sure he is strong enough to control the urge to take her.

He wants better than that for her.

His theory is she wants him now for the same reason she needs to work in the E.R.—he's broken; she needs to fix him. He suspects her failure to fully save him ties her to him. The idea of her loving him out of a sense of duty or empathy is unacceptable to House. If she hadn't wanted him while whole, he would not now become a stone tied around her neck because of her fucked-up sense of duty, no matter how much he wants her. That should have been Stacy's responsibility. She was the one who supposedly did love him whole, and was too much of a bitch to love him broken yet too selfish to let him risk death for the chance of being whole.

Cameron doesn't act on the attraction either. He's still not sure why. He's sure his brokenness makes him practically catnip to her. This puzzle doesn't make the situation any easier. Before the infarction he had observed she was resided to being alone, and to remain, herself, broken. Not many other people would have noticed, but he's not other people.

Quite a few men just assumed she was a closet lesbian. And though he loved to imagine that, he knew she projected being off limits for reasons other than her sexual preference. There was always an attraction between them, and there were the occasional lustful looks at others, though she never acted on them. Or if she did, she was one hell of a magician to hide it from him; he has a knack for telling when people were involved.

It had become his great hobby to try to figure her out and the puzzle had once distracted him from the original attraction. They'd both done well to put one another in the friend/colleague column in those few years. It's an anomalous conflict within himself—wishing he could have that simple relationship again but refusing to exercise control over the part of his mind that so badly needs more from her.

_Wonder what Wilson is up to?_ He thinks, forcing his mind away from thoughts of her, as he walks through the lobby and toward the elevators. However, he's unable to continue the train of thought thanks to his path being intersected by Cuddy.

"Good morning, Dr. House. I still need your proposal." Cuddy. His former friend turned inadvertent nemesis.

Sidestepping her, he continues on. "So write it and leave me be."

Her total disregard for his wishes is something he doesn't seem to be capable of forgiving. He'd always trusted her and she betrayed him in the deepest way. Sometimes he wants to forgive her, knows he should forgive her, but in truth, just can't seem to find it in himself.

She turns and falls into stride beside him. "You seem to have forgotten how this process works.  _You_  decide what  _you_  want to research next,  _you_  find the grants available,  _you_  write the proposal, then  _I_  review and approve or deny said proposal, and get it in the hands of our grant writers."

Reaching the elevator, he raises his cane to press the up button. Doing so repeatedly as if that might somehow make the damned thing lower faster so he could make his escape. When the doors finally open, he steps into the doorway and blocks her path to follow, while holding the closing doors at bay.

"I've got an idea, why not pick something you know you'll approve, get my intern, Don or Dan or whatever his name is, to write it up and work with the grant writers and then let me know what it is I'm supposed to be curing for the next five years or so." The elevator's automated voice chimes in loudly commanding him to "Stand clear of the closing doors." And with that, he steps back and leaves a frustrated Cuddy on the first floor.

_If they want grant funding, they can do the damned paperwork themselves. I bring more than enough fucking money to this place as it is._

It had been like this since he came back from his recovery leave. Almost a year, and still he evaded nearly every assignment she gave him. Tenure protected him from losing his job, and so long as he wrote a published paper here or discovered something interesting every few years there, the University and its teaching hospital were happy to keep his name on their faculty list for the purposes of fundraising and recruitment.

He'd done more the ten years prior to his infarction than most in his field do in a lifetime. A few years of wallowing in self-pity will do very little to change what his name alone offers their bottom line.

_No need to let Cuddy spoil the mood from my stellar weekend._ He thought as he exited the elevator to make his way to Wilson's office. He'd had great sex and great sleep for the first time in two years. That deserves a little bit of happiness, even from a misanthrope.

As always, House barges in, possible patient appointment be damned. Much to Wilson's relief, he was in his office alone when his best friend shoved open the door and planted himself on the couch. "I scored us tickets to a concert this Friday. It's that really badass Steely Dan cover band I was telling you about. It's about as good as your going to get live, short of the real thing."

"Great. What time?" They'd been hoping to catch the band for a while, but between their schedules and the fact that the band nearly always sold out, it had yet to materialize.

"9:00. We can leave from work, grab dinner on the way. You're driving by the way," House ordered and stretched his arms across the back of the couch, and pulled his good leg up placing the ankle on the knee of his bad leg.

"It's a date then," Wilson answered, still more focused on his work than his friend.

"If it's a date I expect sex. Especially with the strings I had to pull to get these," House joked and it was then Wilson heard the difference in House's voice. He looked up and observed the man and it hit him.

"Um, speaking of. You got laid this weekend, didn't you? And not by your normal prostitute; you're practically glowing and you have quite the evidence peeking out from the edge of your collar. You're professional ladies don't normally mark you."

House gave a curt nod and a wicked smirk, "I upgraded my service. Well worth it."

"Wait… You finally had sex with Cameron didn't you?" Wilson shakes his head and laughs, rambling on, eyes returning to his paperwork. If he had taken a moment from his excitement to notice the look on House's face, he'd know he was dead wrong long before inserting his foot completely in his mouth. "You dawg, I knew it was only a matter of time before those looks turned into sex. I should have known it was you that put that smile on her face this morning. I want details. Is she as hot naked as I assume? Is she wild? Into anything kinky… Well, besides you?"

House was deflated. Had she found someone? Wilson wasn't the keen observer of people that he was, but the guy did have a radar for picking up on the signs of being well laid. It was the one area House knew he always stood the strongest chance of losing a bet.

_Dammit._ He thought.  _I don't want her fucking someone else._

_How's that going to work, genius? You're the one who wants her to go off and be happy without your broken and cranky ass._

_Yeah, well I don't have to like it!_

His mind argued with itself for a minute, before House stood up and charged out of the room and headed down toward the E.R. Leaving a confused Wilson in his wake. If Wilson had seen her this morning, she may still be here. This was something he needed to observe for himself, to see if he drew the same conclusion.

_Well, not the same conclusion, because obviously, you know you didn't fuck her._

_Christ, you're my own brain, you know what I fucking mean._

When he got to the E.R. she was signing paperwork at the nurses' station. Hanging back, he looked at her and took in her aura. It was calmer than he'd seen it in weeks. His emotions were conflicted. On the one hand, he wanted more than anything for her to be happy. On the other, he wanted nothing more than the reason for her happiness to be him, and not some other asshole.

_Who are you fooling? You can't be the reason for anyone's happiness. You're too fucked up now. If you could have convinced her five years ago maybe, but now… If only either of you was romantic enough to believe that two broken people could make a whole._

She looked up then and met his eyes. It happened again, but this time it was different. Both their primal urges had been sated for the moment and the imagery was calmer.

_He placed a hand on her cheek and his head leaned in. Lips barely grazed and his tongue slipped out slowly to request a taste of hers. Granting him entrance, she returned his kiss._

The image triggered something in him. It felt too much like a memory. He shook it off and his eyes focused back to the real world and on Cameron who was now standing before him.

"Hey House. You look good today. I'm glad. It's been awhile." She said with a tenderness and deep affection. Her aura was dominated with calm blues, but there were hints of orange, purple and, of course, the melancholy dark blue which always remained at the center.

"Yeah, I had a really good weekend. I slept well for the first time in forever, I think."

He found it easy to be, quote-unquote,  _normal_ , around her. With everyone else, he wielded his biting wit and sarcasm, but he had no need of it with her, at least not when they were alone. Around others, they were both different. Both had walls ten miles high. He could be honest only when with her, and it felt good and perfect.

_Why can't we just be like this?_  He thought to himself.

His mind answered in her voice.  _Because I'll eventually hurt you in ways you can't fathom, and I'll have to live with that._

He hated that his experience with Stacy had made him this way.

Allison hated that she had to let him think her answer was his imagination. It wasn't. She couldn't risk it. Not after the last time she'd let herself believe she could have a shot at normal. She couldn't bear it. It was hard enough to deny her desire for him before the accident—before everything they shared just after it. The aftermath of that moment made her life with-but-without him miserable, but she gladly paid the price to save him. Her only regret was that he was paying too without understanding why.

"You're working late today. Long night?" He asked, hoping she didn't elaborate on activities that may have happened before her shift.

"Yeah. A big mess of a car wreck early this morning just before I was supposed to get out of here. But it's winding down now and I'm heading home." She began walking towards her office and he followed.

He leaned on the doorway and watch her pack up her things. She was still in scrubs and he wondered if she was heading to the showers. Reining his mind in from the image of that, and the thought of joining her, he tried making small talk instead. "I miss you stopping by the lab. I know I haven't been working on anything interesting and Dave is a boring idiot, but maybe there's something cool we can find to debate. I need someone with half a brain down there sometimes."

Packing away her computer she continued the conversation. "I heard you were  _between_  studies."

"I am. Cuddy is on my case to submit a grant proposal. I told her to just pick some worthy disease and send it to the grant writers. I don't think that's going to fly. If you were me, what would you want to study?"

A loaded question indeed. Even if they could undo what had been done, studying her disease would most certainly cost still cost House his life as he knows it. They were so far from a solution without him. Cameron was now convinced Cuddy was right. If there was anyone in the now that had a shot of breaking through, it was him.

Given the turn in events the last year, if she even hinted that she'd had an about-face about enlisting him, they'd press for conversion before he gets much older whether it was wise or not. Lately, her selfish side questions that being a bad thing more and more. Part of her longs to give in. Convert him, just so she could be with him. But the life she's been forced to live has left her as miserable as he is a cripple. But unlike him, her end is nowhere in sight. That truth continues to steal her resolve.  _What good is trading one guilt-fueled misery for another?_

She sighs and answers his question with a lie, "I don't know. But if you want help, I can stop by sometime when I have… "

He surprised her, which was a damned hard thing to do all things considered. But nonetheless, he had taken her arm, turned her and was kissing her.

_God dammit, he tastes so fucking good._ She laments as, for a moment, she gives in and allows herself to kiss back before breaking the kiss and looking up to his eyes. Sadly, she asks him "Greg, you know we can't do this, right?"

"Allison… I… I'm sorry." Again his gut tells him he's done this before, tasted her before, even though his mind knows better. Both of them will back tears.

"Shh, it's ok." She touches his jaw and looks him in the eyes again. "There is nothing to be sorry for, you just bumped into me by accident. No harm done." It was harder every time she had to rewrite his memory. But it was what they had agreed to do, whether he remembers or not.


	7. Intersection

### Princeton, New Jersey. July 10th, 2011

House threw a naked Stacy to the floor. It was only fair after the way she jumped him as he walked out of the bathroom from his shower — clawing and biting like a feral cat in heat. His towel fell off in the process revealing his twitching cock as it began to fill with blood. She stared up at him with a challenge, unphased by hitting the hardwood surface ass first.

Dropping to his knees, he grabbed her by an ankle unceremoniously yanking her toward him. "C'mere, feisty." Quickly spreading her legs and wrapping them around his waist. She locked them and squeezed hard, rubbing her wet pussy all over his growing shaft. He bent down and grabbed her by the back of the head, with a hand full of hair he pulled her face to his own and pushed his tongue into her mouth without question. She responded by ranking her fingernails harshly across his chest and nipples.

He practically tossed her head back to the floor, ending the kiss and grabbed her wrists, pinning her down. He spoke hotly in her ear. "You want my cock, don't you? Need it inside you? Feel how hard you've made me. Now I'm going to have to take it out on your naughty, wet cunt."

He didn't wait for a confirmation. Pushing into her slowly, House felt like every one of the nine inches of his dick was set on fire. She was tight and knew how to use her muscles to clutch him like a vise. He leaned down and bit hard into the meat of her shoulder, daring her to bleed, then licked the tenderized flesh softly and was rewarded with a moan and the thrusting of her hips. The violent thrust was met forcefully with his own.

He held her to the floor with little care if he bruised her wrists. She seemed to be impossible to bruise anyway, which made him all the more willing to fuck her roughly and thoroughly. "Goddamnit Stacy, your pussy is squeezing the life out of my dick. I'm going to fuck you until you're wide open; loosen that shit up."

He pulled out to the very tip then plunged forcefully and wholly into her depths again. He could feel the resistant impact of her uterus. She was the first woman he's been with that this action didn't hurt—at least in the bad way. He was very sure it hurt her in the good way that both of them seemed to crave.

His pace increased as he held her down and fucked her. He kissed her more forcefully, biting her lower lip. She pulled away hard before he could break the skin, but not for lack of trying on his part. Something deep inside him longed to taste her blood. He was a kinky fuck, and he knew it. But then again, she didn't appear to mind, but for this one reluctance. She seemed unwilling to allow him to break the skin and she was careful with him in the same way.

He tried hard to put it from his mind, not sure why it suddenly bothered him so much. He'd only had one girlfriend who was willing to try blood play. But she didn't like hard violent sex like Stacy, so they'd cut one another with a blade. It was good, but it wasn't what he craved. It wasn't raw enough. He rarely confided in any of his bedmates that he wished they'd just bite into him and really taste him or that he wanted to do the same to them.

Despite this, at the end of the day, Stacy was as close to the perfect fuck as he had come.

_Then again, it's not even been a week._   _Maybe she just needs time to trust me._

The thought of it made him wild. He growled. She came just when he thought he couldn't push into her harder or faster. A moment later she was on top of him, somehow having managed to roll him over and slam him into the floorboards. "Seems you've lost the upper hand. Now I'm going to ride your dick hard and you're going to come hard. But I want you to tell me right before you're ready. I want to finish you with my mouth; suck your come out; taste mine all over you as I do it."

Pushing up with his arms, he found couldn't overpower her again. He was desperate to bite her or suck her "Fuck Stacy, I need some part of you in my mouth or I'm gonna die. I'm getting close. Put your pussy on my face when you suck my dick. I need to taste your come too."

With that, she released him and turned around to sit on his face and take him in her mouth. They each feasted on the other. He came hard into her throat and, as he did, he bit down on her clit. His fingernails, which were longer on his right hand for use as picks on his guitar, clawed into her ass cheek to hold her down on his mouth as her body reacted to his bite with a jolt. Then he sucked her gently until she writhed on top of him and his mouth was filled with her slick and delicious fluid. He gently licked her clean as she continued to shake in orgasm, nibbled once more for good measure on her labia, before finally releasing her to turn and lay on top of him.

Coming down, he was suddenly aware of just how rough he'd been while caught up in the throes of passion. It also occurred to him they'd never really talked about it. Though he was sure she liked it, he suddenly wanted to hear the words.

"I didn't hurt you, did I?" He asked and kissed her forehead gently.

"Not in any way that I didn't thoroughly enjoy. I'd tell you otherwise, and believe me, you'll have no doubt about it when I don't like something. There is…" she stopped for a moment, hesitant to continue.

"Tell me, Stacy. I never want to hurt you in a bad way." He commanded softly and sincerely.

"I can tell you want to, but I don't want to break the skin. I had a bad experience with that and I don't want to repeat it. You can do anything to me but draw blood. I won't do that to you either." She lied in part. She had not ever had the experience.

It was forbidden for any of the  _new converts_ , those part of the transfusion experiment, to take blood in the old way. Not all were able to resist, but enough were to keep the program running. She'd be damned if she was going to be one who failed. Doing so would cost the program and her mentor dearly and most likely cost her this assignment. She had to stay steadfast to the rule or risk losing everything she had worked so hard for the last 25 years.

Damn, it was difficult because she could feel how badly he wanted it. He was extremely high on the ESP scale for a ne-prerojen, even for a polovica, and she knew this meant he could read auras, but it also meant his own emotions were projected more clearly to someone with a similar gift. She was curious what it would be like to taste him, but everything she'd been taught expressly forbids it. She'd been sheltered from feeding on blood and, from all she'd ever been told, it was with good reason.

Every two weeks she received the necessary supplement via transfusion and this is why she, unlike some others of her kind, found it more comfortable to live and work with ne-prerojen. Her role was crucial to the next step in evolution for her people. She would not let them, or herself down.

The elders likened those like her to a tiger who was raised as a pet, never allowed to kill, always well fed, the normal feeding behaviors never nurtured beyond play and never needed to ensure survival.

Yet…

One can never really domesticate a tiger. The potential for play to turn violent and deadly is ever present.

Avoiding the taste of human blood, especially fresh blood was paramount in keeping the animal inside of her tamed. Sex and feeding were drives that were woven tightly together for her kind.

His desire for even the smallest bloodletting during sex was an enormous concern for conversion. It wasn't unheard of from a polovica; though they didn't inherit the necessity for consuming it, the taste for blood was sometimes inherited. It was something he needed to prove he could control now. More than that, she'd be sorely punished by her superiors if it was found she let him have even a drop of  _her_  blood without their consent.

They were silent for a while after she told him her demand. He wasn't surprised, but he was disappointed to have his gut feeling confirmed.  _Can't always get what you want,_ he thought to himself, not sure why it disappointed him so much. It wasn't something most people would do. She had seemed different somehow, so he'd hoped.

Stacy could see the shift in House's aura. He was disappointed. It bothered her and she wished she could give him what he wanted, but she knew it was too much of a danger to them both. For a moment it crossed her mind to use her abilities to convince him it wasn't something he really wanted, but she knew that would do him no good in the long-term. It was woven into him too deeply to be overwritten by suggestion.

And it would be pointless. The Coalition needed to know he could control his actions and his urges freely because it would be ten times harder if he were infected.

"Greg. I need you to tell me that you're okay with that. I enjoy fucking you. I enjoy that you fuck relentlessly, but this is one thing, maybe the only thing, I'm not willing to let you do or do to you."

Sighing, he tells himself this is the most well-rounded partner his kinky ass is going to get. She's smart, beautiful, funny in an acerbic way (which is the best way in his opinion) and a damn fine lay. "I'm okay with it. I promise I won't do anything to you that I know you don't want." As the words came out of his mouth, he hoped she'd come around.

* * *

#### The next morning.

Lisa Cuddy sat across from Allison Cameron and smiled at this woman who appeared to be a formidable doctor. One who was as smart as she was young and beautiful.

After working with The Coalition for the better part of her life, Cuddy still couldn't tell if she could believe what she sees or not. Sometimes they disclosed the converted to her, other times she was left to wonder. Given all she's seen, she knew one thing: she preferred to know the prerojen from the ne-prerojen.

She also knew better than to ask out loud. Oh, Cuddy knew that if Allison was infected that Cuddy didn't need to speak for the question to be asked. At least in so many words. Her aura would give away her curiosity. She sure as hell was glad that most of them couldn't read minds outright. At least not without bonding. And she wasn't going to do that of her own free will.

No matter. Either way, she would play the game as if this were any other orientation interview. She looked down at the file in her hand, "So I see here you graduated high school early and studied at Cambridge. Impressive. And the Mayo Clinic. Did you work with Robert Johnson?"

Allison cringed inwardly at the name Robert but maintained her professional outward demeanor. "Yes. Dr. Johnson was instrumental in steering me toward my immunology specialty. However, after doing a few stints in the E.R. early in my fellowship, I was, as my mentor Dr. Imran liked to put it, 'seduced by the Darkside' and I picked up the second specialty in Emergency. It's really where my passion is."

"Well, I'm happy to have you on board. Our readmissions have been on the uptick of late and I'd like to see us get those numbers back down. I'm also always excited to have another competent woman on my staff. It's damn depressing the lack of female applicants in this day and age. I'm very happy to snag all the qualified ladies that come my way." Cuddy stood and on cue, Cameron stood as well and they shook hands firmly.

"I'm happy to be here. And honestly, I think it's great how far women have advanced. If only all the women believed it, I think we'd be primed for a takeover."

"I couldn't agree more. So you ready for the tour? I'll show you our full facility then drop you off in the E.R. to meet the day manager Dr. Kutner and he'll walk you through the procedures and get you set up for your first shift. You'll be working a week of days to train with him, then the night shift is yours. Since Dr. Taub was dismissed, Kutner has been pulling more than his fair share of doubles to keep things running. I know he'll be very excited to have you on board."

"I heard about the scandal. I can't say as I blame his wife for making a scene either."

"No, he was pretty much a dick and deserved what he got. Before we start, though, I have one small bit of  _other_  business. The Coalition has asked me to loop you in on a potential recruitment in progress. We have an agent in legal, Stacy Miller, who is evaluating our infectious disease expert, Dr. Gregory House." Cuddy reaches into her center desk drawer and pulls out a flash drive and hands it to Allison who takes it with a nod and places it in the pocket of her white doctors' coat.

"I've heard of Dr. House. I read his article outlining his trial on colistin versus colistin plus meropenem. His methods are rather… " she paused to consider the right word but Cuddy interjected.

"Reckless. Ballsy. Insane. Brilliant." She sighed. "Take your pick of adjective. They all fit. But I wouldn't put this hospital at a constant risk of lawsuit if he weren't the most amazing medical mind I've ever met. Or even heard of. I've been pushing The Coalition to consider him for years. But he's as reckless as he is brilliant, so they have concerns he's not the best candidate for inclusion much less conversion. Truth be told, I'm not sure I'd want him converted either, but to have him study the pathogen even for the next 20 years might be the difference for a cure in this century."

Allison took note of Cuddy's glowing aura as she sung the praises of her colleague. She nodded in understanding. "It's hard to see the big picture when your time is so recognizably finite. The damage that can be done with even one bad conversion is devastating for both the victims and those who bare the weight of rebirthing a man into a monster. As for inclusion, I suppose I need to know him before I can fully understand the trepidations there."

If Cuddy wasn't sure if Allison was prerojen before, she was now and she found it unsettling. One beautiful prerojen sniffing around House was mildly disturbing. Though she very much liked Stacy and knew she was one from the small and experimental group of new, supposedly tamer, converts, she still worried. Now a second prerojen was here, and from everything her gut told her, Allison was an old convert. Even as mere women, House would be on either of them like a fly on honey, but because of the charismatic nature of their kind, House would be hard pressed to resist them even if he wanted to.

Hell, knowing what she's told The Coalition of him, a wild threesome might just be something they dialed up as a test. Something to push him to the brink. She knew what he did not about his own nature. It was as much a reason to avoid romantic involvement with him as her considering him as a brother of sorts. His boundary issues might trigger a dangerous response in a sexual relationship with a prerojen. She'd heard stories. She didn't want those things to happen to her friend.

Cuddy's emotions radiated, and Allison picked up on a few flashes of imagery. Her concern for House was so profound it made her quite easy to read. It also showed Cameron, Cuddy was not foolish enough to fully trust any of their kind, which meant she was a wise woman. Eric had advised her of as much. Allison could see why she'd earned a respected place amongst the included. "Dr. Cuddy, have you ever met a lovec?" Cameron asked.

"Not to my knowledge. I saw the aftermath because of my mother, and that is enough to know that if I have met a lovec, I am damned lucky to be here now for you to ask. Why?"

Allison nodded but wasn't ready to answer that question. She fixed her gaze directly to Cuddy's "Look, what you fear isn't going to happen. I'm here to work damage control and observe Stacy on her assignment. Provided guidance if need be. I would not have accepted the assignment you fear, though I wish I could tell you it was out of the realm of possibility from The Coalition."

Cuddy gave her a wary look. Cameron sighed and continued. "I've been told you have the gift of true sight. So, I'm saving myself the trouble of trying to tell a traditional lie, which I was never good at, because I know you know better. I'm not here to seduce House, or anyone else for that matter. If I had my way, there would be no more converts, regardless of their potential value. This disease, despite the surface benefits of long life, is not something I would wish on anyone. The price is far too high. But that is not my decision to make, and so I am here doing my job, just like you."

Cuddy nodded in the way of thanks and her aura calmed. "Glad to hear it. Look, I've learned not to ask about what The Coalition chooses to expose in our briefings. But, I'll tell you this, if your work puts this hospital at risk, I need to know. If this investigation into House puts him in danger, I need to know. He's had some shit deals in his life. I don't want this to become another. I'm the one responsible for bringing him into this. I certainly don't want to regret it later."

Allison had read Cuddy's file and discussed her history at length with Eric. She was the rarest case, born to a mother infected violently while late in her 3rd trimester. And while the placental barrier kept her safe from the infection long enough to be delivered via c-section, Cuddy did not remain unaffected. She'd somehow inherited an immunity to the empathic suggestions used by prerojen to alter the memories of the uninfected. She'd been included her entire life. Few ne-prerojen knew the infected better, at least this was the impression given to her by Eric.

She was also well known as a woman who was not to be crossed.

"I can make no promises, but I will do what is in my power to keep both safe."

* * *

Two hours later her tour was nearly at an end. "Well, I was hoping you'd get to meet House before your shift, but at least Parker was there to show you around the lab. Hopefully, he's in Stacy's office. But there's just as much of a chance he's watching PornHub on the back pew of the Chapel," Cuddy sighed.

Cameron returned a half smile. "She's a nice kid. Seems like she's got a bright future ahead of her."

"I think so." Cuddy nodded as they continued down the corridor. "House doesn't take voluntary interest in just anyone. That's why I had her put on the watch list. She wants a career at the CDC anyway, so I figure she seems like a natural fit for inclusion. House wrote her a recommendation for Johns Hopkins. Which is unheard of, from him. At least a serious one."

"So you've known Dr. House for a long time?"

Cuddy nodded, "We went to undergraduate school together. We were lab partners in a few classes. Same study groups and all."

"So he's a friend?" Cameron asked.

"Of sorts. Work friend. We don't have much outside of these walls in common. I think our different approaches work well to keep the other in balance. I always want to play it too safe. He's of the devil-may-care-so-long-as-I-get-the-results-I-need camp."

Cuddy slowed and Allison matched her pace. They pause at what appears to be an office door, but there is no name on or around it to give away who might be occupying it. Allison assumes that means it's the office of the new lawyer.

Allison had already been fully briefed on Stacy Miller and on the Gregory House assignment. Her role in all of this was to provide mentorship to the younger prerojen, offer any additional insights into House related to working with him, and report back to Eric with anything of note; good, bad or otherwise. Allison knew this was Stacy's first assignment back in the real world with no safety net.

She also knew that Cuddy was right. If given the opportunity, Stacy would have to evaluate if the reports of his cravings during sex were accurate and if they extend to situations outside of the bedroom. They'd been watching him for two years now. It didn't take much effort to find out he inherited the taste. It wasn't a deal breaker, but his everything else paired with it meant if he weren't a damned genius they wouldn't be wasting time and resources on him now.

However, what Cuddy or Stacy didn't know or realize was the true level of desperation permeating from the leadership council. Were Allison not so close to Eric and Remy she'd have no idea either. But they were practically her adoptive parents. The truth of the matter was there was an uprising brewing amongst the Lovci. For hundreds of years, they were content to let the Slepar, 'imposters' as they would put it, 'play amongst the sheep.' But the modern world, with all of its technologies threatening exposure at every turn, have the Lovci uncharacteristically united in a cause.

Cuddy rapped on the door. "Come on in," Stacy called out. Cuddy opened the door and led the way in. It was then Allison got her first whiff of him. It was intoxicating, to say the least, and somehow familiar. Years of practiced resolve allowed her to maintain her cool outward appearance and keep her drives in check.

She saw him next as Cuddy stepped to the side to start the introductions. He didn't bother standing up from his relaxed position on the couch. He took his time looking her over and for a moment she had some difficulty reading him. But one didn't need a sixth sense to tell what he was thinking. He was taking in her appearance and she could see when their eyes met that he liked what he saw. Then his aura lit up like Christmas tree.

It was then he spoke. "Jesus Cuddy. How is a man supposed to concentrate in this damned hospital when you keep hiring hot babes. I've only just become immune to Thelma and Louise after twenty-two years of having you thrusting them in my face all the time."

Cuddy looked up to the ceiling, long used to his vulgar references to her breasts, then puts her arms on her hips and starts to rebut. However, Allison interjected, "It's fine Dr. Cuddy. I know his type. They just want to see what they can get away with."

House smiled, "Oh I hope you mean 'know' in the biblical sense. If not…"

It was then that Stacy cleared her throat. "Okay, Greg. We got it. You like sex with 'hot babes' of which you count us among. We're really flattered you're hoping this scene turns into that porn you watched last week. But your toxic-masculinity act is seriously not always as cute as you think it is."

Allison managed to break eye contact and looked over to see Stacy standing behind her desk with her arm outstretched. "I'm Stacy Miller. You must be our new E.R. hire Allison Cameron."

"The one and only." Allison greeted, taking her had in a firm shake, and noted the slightest tint of green in Stacy's aura. House had made her jealous. She was going to need to work on blocking those pheromones more effectively. It gave away her youth. Generally, it could sometime take months or even years together for the elder prerojen to read each other past the purple. Neither of them was anywhere near that, but one of the first things they learned how to filter was jealousy and intimidation. Not that Allison was more than a child herself in the grand scheme of things. But if she was a child, Stacy was an infant.

She wondered if Stacy could even fathom how young she really was. Allison certainly couldn't at her age. No, then she'd felt long-lived and still close enough to her first birth to believe how she felt. That knowledge gave her a bad feeling about this whole affair.

"Emergency medicine?" House interrupted her thoughts, still sitting in his position. The woman focused on him once more. His right leg was crossed figure-four with the ankle laid across the left knee. Both his arms spanned the back of the couch and Cameron thought he looked all too delicious but certainly not simply as prey. Normal men didn't smell like he smelled to her. Hell, she'd been around thousands of ne-prerojen, many of them polovica and she's never had one affect her like Gregory House. "Jesus, that's diagnostically boring," he snorted and pulled her out of her thoughts.

"I like the fast pace. I also like working with people." She answered, still exercising full control as she considered her true reaction. She read his medical chart and saw listed a history of visual synesthesia. She knew the real underlying cause. His cynical mind would most likely laugh at the prospect of what she knew him to be — a child of an  _immortal_.

He continued to challenge her. "Well, there's another mistake. I only like working with other people when they are as smoking hot as the three of you."

"What's that mean about Wilson," Cuddy asked. Obviously long used to his personality.

"Oh, he's the hottest of all. Haven't you heard anything the nurses say? How could I not want tender, gay, sex with him."

Allison wasn't sure what to make of him. She could tell he used this act to carefully push most people away. He wanted the world to see him as a chauvinistic ass and she had no idea why.

But she knew that if she ever let her guard down he would not miss the opening. She'd heard that some polovica could read people as well as a prerojen. Some could even read prerojen as easily. Most polovica with the ability to harness the sense were raised and trained with their true fathers. Without training and practice, the whole mess could be more overwhelming than useful. Many like him, with no father to guide them, simply tuned it out over time like one tunes out the white noise of their home appliances.

It was clear he had managed to figure out how to use what he sensed to read people. His attraction to a job with few co-workers spoke to his inability to figure out how to turn down the noise when it wasn't useful. He obviously didn't entertain the idea that anyone else in the room could see pheromones in colors radiating out from every person so he held none of his back. Those colors expressed his sexual desire for her and Stacy was no joke. Usually, she could also see flashes of imagery from most ne-prerojen's thoughts, but strangely not his. By the looks of his aura, she was sure they were currently erotic.

Then again the giant hickeys on his neck lent themselves to volumes of imagery. He and Stacy had apparently wasted no time acting on the mutual attraction. Allison feared for both of them equally and prayed to a god she didn't believe in that Eric knew what he was doing when he recommended Stacy for this job.


	8. Chapter 8

### Chicago, Illinois. May 25th, 1865

It was a beautiful and warm spring day. The blue sky above her was completely clear, save a few fluffy clouds that held no threat of inclement weather. Lying in the field of grass, Allison Reynolds smiled as she recalled the charming doctor she'd met the day before.

It was his accent that really drew her in. She'd never met anyone from Australia before and the unique inflections and unfamiliar turns of phrase melted her and sent waves of heat straight down to the apex of her thighs. He was as handsome as he was charming, thick, dirty blond hair, soft blue eyes. And his lips… She longed to taste his beautiful, thick lips, to feel them on her body, between her legs.

It was whorish of her to have these blatantly sexual thoughts, but the truth was she missed sex. If it weren't for the war with the Confederacy, she'd be long married and likely the mother of a few at 24. But, the fighting had robbed her of her husband and first love, William Reynolds, as it had robbed a whole generation of most its young men.

After his death, she had received a letter from him. It was written from his tent, the night before he was killed. In it, he spoke of his love for her. Mourned that he had not left her with-child before his departure to war. He spoke of another battle that wounded him, of his time in the hospital and the comfort the nurses had given him during his recovery. How they acted as sister and mother to him, and the hundreds of other men wounded in the battlefield.

It was a revolutionary idea to have women nurses in field hospitals, at the beginning even scandalous. But as the war raged on, President Lincoln was advised there was no other way to tend to the slaughter, so he conceded to allow women to join the military in service to the nursing corps.

After losing her love, she felt compelled to enlist. Hoped to make up for the loss she felt in losing her husband, by helping others like him. She lied about her age on her enlistment papers—young pretty girls were general turned away. They would be seeing young men less than fully clothed, touching them in intimate places. The last thing they wanted to do was tarnish a girl's reputation. The preference was over 30, widows or old maids, homely, if at all possible.

Allison met only one of those requirements. She was a widow. However, she was 21 when she enlisted, not 30 as she'd claimed and, she was far too beautiful. They almost sent her back as soon as she reported, but an influx of wounded found the doctors willing to look the other way as she threw in, immediately making herself useful, before even being trained.

After a month, the medical personnel would have fought anyone tooth and nail who might work against keeping her. She was a natural with the work and had a perfect disposition.

She'd seen so many boys in pieces.

The war changed her; changed her moral compass. She found it hard to believe in God after all she'd seen. Instead, focusing her energies away from faith and instead on the science of medicine, which was far more helpful than a prayer for a miracle.

Most of the doctors she worked with had learned the trade through apprenticeship. It was still a more common practice than formalized schooling which was only just becoming standardized into a four-year program at a handful of Universities.

Because of this, there were many under-qualified quack doctors enlisting and getting tossed from the medical corps after only a few days or weeks. Evolution of ideas is most often birthed in need. And they desperately needed more doctors. So no one begrudged her sex in this wretched situation because she had a natural talent so many of the available men did not.

They encouraged her; lent her medical texts that she spent long hours studying. She learned all she could from every doctor. Some of the more forward thinking of them even began to see her as more than just a girl, or a nurse, but an equal to them.

And finally, the war ended. She allowed herself to rekindle her early dreams of a life as a wife and mother. She was still beautiful and young enough to turn men's heads, even as a widow. Having no children by William had saddened her, but it also meant more men would still be willing to court her.

She also now envisioned how these old dreams would fit with her new ones, which were now deeply entrenched in the practice of medicine.

Maybe Dr. Robert Chase would turn out to be the partner she's hoped for. If nothing else, he may at least serve to quiet her baser needs.

* * *

### Princeton, New Jersey. July 11th, 2011.

**Early A.M.**

Allison awoke with a start. Her mind was still in a fog. Half in dream half awake. It was dark outside. She glanced over to her bedside clock. It was 3 a.m., she was in her new apartment. Slowly she remembered, she was in Princeton. She was training this week to take over the emergency room at Princeton Plainsboro Teaching Hospital. She had to work day shifts this week with Dr. Kutner.

Tossing the covers aside, she climbed out of bed. Sleep would not come back to her with darkness fully set. With a sigh, she stopped by the bathroom, then headed on to the kitchen to put on a pot of coffee.

Once it was brewed, she sat at her new kitchen table and cradled the hot cup. Blowing on the liquid gently as she raised it to her mouth then took a tiny sip. She was troubled by her dream. It was entirely too vivid. Given the subject, she was troubled. It had been perhaps 100 years since she'd dreamt of Robert, but now, so many years later, she felt just for a moment as if she were that lovesick young girl. So ready to make a new life with a new love.

Returning to her life as a doctor must be stirring up the long-buried memories. She'd dared to walk this path long before most women could see past hearth and home as career. It was her calling. She only wishes it were tied to less painful memories. Then again her pain is why she's a doctor in the first place. The one could not exist without the other.

* * *

**Early Afternoon.**

"Hey there, can I join you?" Cameron asked standing at the end of his table, her lunch tray in hand.

"Sure, but it'll cost ya. Have a drink sometime?" Her stomach felt a rush at the idea of having a drink of him. Though she knew what he really was asking.

"You mean like a date?" She answered casually.

He shook his head once slowly as he replied, "Not  _like_  a date — a date. You drink, I drink, maybe later, if the drinks go well we go back to your place. You invite me in for coffee. Coffee is, of course, code for sex. You pretend to go brew a pot. I follow, only to prop you up on the counter and — well, I think you can figure out the rest."

Indeed she could, but she forced herself not to picture it. Instead, she smirked and questioned, "And Stacy?"

"Well, if you really want her to  _come_  along…" House rolled his eyes in mock defeat then smiled and kicked the chair opposite him out from the table with his long right leg. His chin jutted out toward the empty seat as an invitation.

Cameron smirked and sat down, despite his initial attraction and open flirtation with her, she could feel he had loyalty beginning to form to Stacy. What was impossible to tell was whether his personal moral code or the side effects of sex with a prerojen played the bigger part in it. She could see he was conflicted. Though she couldn't read his thoughts she was sure she knew the root cause. He'd made his move on Stacy with confidence and now she, Cameron, was making him wonder if, for once, his rash actions had cost him something else, someone else, he might enjoy more.

"She's not my type," Cameron joked and it was true, but not in the way he thought. She didn't have interest in fucking other prerojen. Without a love bond, sex with another of her kind was just sex. Some enjoyed it, but she didn't even have the off-handed daydream about it.

"Too bad you're not willing to get your lesbian groove on, I was thinking a threesome would be amazing," he answered, with no idea that gender preference in terms of sex meant nothing to her at this point. Though she supposes, that for her at least, prerojen on prerojen sex seemed about the same as gay sex to a fully heterosexual ne-prerojen.

"I don't disagree a threesome with the  _right_  woman would hot, but, sadly for you, Stacy isn't that woman." She enjoyed watching his aura flash hot at the idea she would enjoy being in a threesome and she knows it's not lost on him that she never excluded him from the idea.

Sex was tied to needs beyond breeding or companionship. It was far more exhilarating when it involved a willing pijača. A beverage. She smirked at the elder's term. She'd long since learned that pijača are just as sweetly flavored in female form as male, though, thus far she'd only ever been tempted to romantically bond with males. She was certainly tempted now, but she reigned herself back in. Forced her urges to the background.

He gave her a curious look and she knew he could, at least to some extent, read her more than she was comfortable with. The report on him hadn't been exaggerated, but there was something more to it than raw ability.

Something.

She felt that odd connection again. And again they exchanged curious looks as they read each other's auras for clues.

It seemed like an age had passed, but it wasn't more than a second and he smiled mischievously. "Sadly for  _you,_ Stacy isn't that woman. She's a spectacular lay."

"Lucky for you then, you're all taken care of. So, I guess you don't really need that drink." She realized it was going to be nearly impossible to not flirt with him, or to get wrapped up in his pure sexual energy. But she couldn't allow it to go further than flirting. "I heard you just got the Frederick J. Williamson Grant. Congrats."

He easily changed gears, which fascinated her. A second ago she was sure if she'd wanted it, he would have texted Stacy to join them and fucked them both in the middle of the cafeteria. His colors shifted away from the sexual clear reds, to oranges and yellows as he began to talk about his work. "Thanks. I was hoping for something more exotic than Meningitis, but I missed the deadline for everything else. I lost my last paperwork minion due to  _professional differences_ ," he added air-quotes to emphasize. "I had too much to deal with after that to do the paperwork myself. I didn't pick up Parker until late second quarter and all the good grants are posted first quarter."

"I think you'll be okay." She could tell he was feigning boredom. She wondered why. Another puzzle. "Which form will you study?"

He shrugs. "I dunno. I'll prob just pass most the work off to Park and she can pick. She needs something to do for the internship this fall and I need more time with the PS4."

"If it were me, I'd go for eosinophilic meningitis. I've always been interested in parasitic infections," she dropped a breadcrumb hoping he'd follow.

"Then why work in the ER? The only parasites you'll get there are the ones beating their wives under the guise of being a slippery staircase."

She offered a half smile at his analogy and answered his question. "I've spent time in the lab, but it's not me. Like I told you yesterday, I like helping people and I like a fast-paced job. ER gives me both. There's nothing more satisfying than bulldozing your way through triage. When you get it right, when you save the maximum number of lives, it's like no other rush. It's like having to be 100 different kinds of doctor on speed. Seconds to diagnose, moments to treat. Repeat as needed."

House took note of the shift in her aura as well. Hers matched his as she spoke of her job with true enthusiasm. He respected that. Understood it. Knew it wasn't something as common as one might think. Even amongst the happy. Sometimes, especially amongst the happy. But to look at her, he would have never pegged her as a trama queen. There was an underlying softness to her. Not to mention her near perfect physical features that she could use as a one-way ticket to easy street with just about any warm-blooded straight man on the planet.

He goaded to see what information she'd give up, "Huh. I would have pegged you for the bleeding heart type. The kind that can't deal with the death parts."

She enjoyed that she brought out his curiosity as much as he brought out hers. He thought he was being clever but he didn't know she could see his aura even more clearly than he saw hers. "Just goes to prove you don't know me. I don't enjoy the death parts, but I've seen more than my fair share. More than enough to have developed a unique respect for death. Sometimes, it's a mercy. Most doctors figure that out eventually. I just happen to have learned it young."  _And observed the lesson for 150 years._ She thought to herself, while she let him mull over her words.

His curiosity was still peaked, "I looked up your file and I googled you. I guess you've been some sort of wunderkind who has rocketed to the top of her field, which is even more impressive considering you are as beautiful as you are smart. I suppose you've just been broken somewhere along the way, so you know what it feels like."

He hit the nail on the head and she raised an eyebrow. Impressive, indeed. And now it was her turn. "I think the best doctors have been. Which begs the question, 'How are you broken, Dr. House?'"

He cocked his head at that. She was treading on territory he liked to ignore, as much as a man could ignore his father. He thought for a moment she might already know the answer to that question.  _Interesting, maybe I'm not the only one snooping around the other's history._

She was surprising.

It was refreshing.

It was a puzzle. And oh how he loved a good puzzle. It was right up there with great sex. It struck him for a moment that he was in a position to get both his favorite drugs now. Hot, violent sex with Stacy and a supremely interesting puzzle in Cameron. He'd probably get less of both if he held onto the idea of having both women in his bed. Separately or together.

There was something else he couldn't put his finger on. Something about Cameron that made him feel an almost family-like connection with her. But not exactly that either, unless he was suddenly prone to incest. It was something unlike anything he'd felt before. She put him at ease. His mind and emotions tended to be in constant overdrive, but just then, talking with her, he'd felt as if the emotional noise of everyone in the room faded to the background. As if he'd walked into a recording studio with sound panels that absorbed all the ambient noise of the room.

Only for him, it was the noise of his synesthesia lighting up every person within a hundred feet of him. Just then, with her, it was tuned out without him even trying. Like 30 voices were silenced to let one ring through.

He suddenly realized he was staring at her, still not having answered her question. That was far more than he wanted to give away, already. So he changed the subject. "Parasites huh? I guess that's less boring than bacteria and viruses. Probably more fun to play with too."

She smirked and he mirrored it. This was going to be an interesting relationship, for both of them.

* * *

### Princeton New Jersey, August 26th, 2016

House was one-hundred percent sure he'd made the wrong decision that day back in 2011. But he was already so far entangled with Stacy at the point Cameron walked into his life… Really, the only way he could have changed his actions were if the events had occurred in some other order. Or, perhaps he'd just missed the perfect moment. Chronos or Kairos.

He remembers something he read once on the subject: "The world takes a breath, and in the pause before it exhales, fates can be changed."

_Wonder how my fates would have changed?_

The moment he first laid eyes on her there was certainly something about her beyond her mere physical beauty. She was like a model compared to the other women in the room on the day they met. Oh, Stacy and Cuddy were hot, but in a sultry May West meats Corporate America kind of way. Cameron was a classic picture of beauty. A princess to his frog. One kiss and he might have turned into a prince. He'll never know now.

_Fuck it. It doesn't matter without a goddamned time machine._

He picked up the glass from the bar and drained the final ounce of a double Glenfiddich 16 year, neat. His brain then turned its focus to his friend, who just returned from the bathroom. The band was still on their set break and the little club was alive with people talking and drinking.

Wilson was smiling as he sat back down on his stool and took a drink from his beer. "Man, those guys were fucking amazing! I can't believe you scored tickets. And this club is cool too. Is it new?"

House nodded, "Yeah. Been open maybe three months now. Intimate listening venue with a shit ton of bourbon and scotch selections. What's not to love?"

"How did you get these tickets anyway?"

"I fucked one of the owners. She came into the clinic with a cold, then she came in the clinic on my hot cock. She was so satisfied, she paid me in tickets."

Wilson rolled his eyes, "No, seriously."

"What?" House asked with a mock look of hurt. "That's totally something I'd do."

"Maybe before. But not now." Wilson raised an eyebrow and took another swig, then his posture sake a little as he changed the subject. "I'm sorry about that whole Cameron thing. I really thought…"

"Well, thinking has never been your strong suit," House groaned back. Wishing his friend would have just let it drop.

"Haha," Wilson replied with dripping sarcasm, then sighed. "I don't get you two. Both of you are miserable most the time. You have been since you were rolled into her E.R. Save everyone in the hospital the trouble of enduring your public emoting and just have sex already. Maybe try this crazy concept called  _dating_. You like her. She likes you. Even when Stacy was still around that was true. Now that she's long out of the pict—"

House cut him off, "Besides the fact that from day one she's put up the 'off limits' sign to me and every other man who's even given her a sideways glance, we now have the complication of my being a cripple. If she did decide to, or maybe has decided to, move on and open herself up to a relationship I'm not even — "

"You can stop that shit right now." Wilson was having none of House's self-pity. "You have a limp, not a limp dick. Or at least I assume as much since your spending your retirement savings on prostitutes and even you would find that combination to be a bad investment. So she has to be on top more. I'm sure you'd both just  _hate_  that. Your minds are still 100% compatible. All you have to do is use them and you'd see it too."

House signaled the bartender for another and remained silent. Wilson was right on every logical level but House's gut still said it was all wrong. He was wrong for her. There would be nothing good to come from giving into the attraction. He tried to focus on the band which was returning to the stage to start the second set only to have Wilson huff beside him. "Goddamned idiots. The both of you. Especially you."

"Shhhhh. There's no talking while performances are in progress. Jesus, Wilson, show some class!"

Wilson rolled his eyes and let it go. If the two wanted to suffer a love unrequited he couldn't stop them. He just wished he could understand why both preferred the miserable state they were in.

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The quote: "The world takes a breath, and in the pause before it exhales, fates can be changed." — McKinley Valentine in her article Chronos & Kairos.
> 
> I was looking for a word or phrase which sums up the concept of a moment in time that we decide something and it changes everything, which was the theme of this chapter and came across this ancient Greek concept of kairos meaning "the right, critical, or opportune moment" (Wikipedia). Then started reading more on it and found the McKinley Valentine article, and just fell in love with that line. So I worked it in.
> 
> Hope everyone is enjoying things thus far! Thanks to all for reading.


	9. Love Bites

### Princeton, New Jersey. October 14th, 2011.

"So how's your new assignment?" Allison's old friend and mentor, Eric Foreman asked as he cut into his well-done steak.

She wrinkled her nose and replied, "It's actually pretty great. I've missed medicine — God! I still don't know how you can you eat it all dried up and over-cooked."

Eric smiled. His white teeth contrasting brightly against his chocolate skin. "I never did like rare steak. Besides, I'm not the one who flirts with veganism. Just eat your greenery and let me enjoy my meat in peace."

"I'm going to have to live in this body a while. I'd be wise to take care of it by eating healthy. But it doesn't mean I don't still know the difference between good and bad steak."

He rolls his eyes and steers the conversation back on point. "I'm glad to hear your new life is more to your liking. I've had a few lackluster assignments over the years and I know how good it feels to return to one's wheelhouse. Oh, and speaking of houses, what is your impression of Dr. House?"

"He's everything the reports say. He took no time in bedding your latest protege. If one didn't know better, one would think her  _his_  pijača. Honestly, I'm not sure she's ready for this. Perhaps you should have lobbed her a softer target if you planned on her seducing sans attachment."

"I thought you disliked working as a recruiter. But if you are volunteering your experience—"

"No," she answered quickly, not entirely sure that his surface teasing was entirely a joke.

"Besides, I think it's too late for that anyway. He already feels more for Stacy than simple attraction. When he likes something it doesn't take long before he goes all in. And he  _likes_  Stacy and he really likes fucking her. The problem is, she also likes him far more than she should. Her aura seeps green when he simply flirts with me. And she knew he would. It's his nature to be extremely sexual. She has no idea the fire she's playing with. And for what it's worth, neither does he."

"We need the best in his field. You are well aware that Von Lieberman is an idiot. For all he did for the cause years ago, he's been stuck on his laurels since. Most of us agree at this point, his discovery of the upír parasite was the luck of being the first on the new equipment. There is strong support from the other leads to out him and rebuild the infectious disease department from the ground up. From everything we've seen in the last two years, I believe Gregory House possess exactly the kind of mind we need for this work." He cut his steak and took another bite. Allison stabbed at her salad.

Eric could read her unease and sighed as he put his utensils down and pushed his plate to the side. He leaned in and spoke with a reassuring tone. "You've been away from the lab for a long time. I've kept you somewhat informed but there is much that is still being kept very quiet. We don't know who we can trust."

"Is it really that bad? Remy indicated as much, in her subtle way, when last she visited. But she was unreadable to me as usual. She mentioned a lab tech was leaking information. No details beyond that."

"Yes. But it's far worse than one rouge lab technician. We have leaks we don't know the source of going out on two fronts — to the allied Lovci and, perhaps even more unsettling, to U.S. government offices that do  _not_  need to know. Obama is great and all but I don't think the executive branch or any of the others are ready for the news that  _vampires_ ", he spoke the term with disdain, "aren't just the stuff of books, movies, and sexy Halloween outfits. Even if we are a far cry in from the myth in real life."

He took another bite before continuing. "They can't even overcome their religious differences — religion itself for that matter — or their political differences. Hell, half the infected still believes we are supernatural, cursed by some god, banished from eternal bliss in the afterlife. Literally raised from the dead!" He huffed, in frustration. "Humanity as a whole is not ready for inclusion on a mass scale, or even a top-secret Washington D.C. scale. We are playing with fire to have included the CDC."

Allison nodded in agreement, but she was confused as to why the topic had been steered. "I appreciate you keeping me in the loop as much as you can, in comfort with your oath, but what does this have to do with House?"

"Stacy. I mentioned it because I know you are worried about Stacy interacting with House. Especially, when he may be that important. And, I suspect by the looks of your aura, you are as drawn to him as she is."

Eric and his wife Remy were hopeless romantics. Despite all his work to replace the traditional way of converting. Despite Allison's fears and her history, they'd wish her in a love bond, like theirs.

Allison cursed under her breath, wishing she could better block her aura from Eric. He smiled, "One day, child. But not today. He's had an effect on you and it's not surprising from what we know of him. I wish we could have found him as a child. Honed his half-breed traits or perhaps converted him in young adulthood. He may still learn to focus them more, once he knows what he is and why. From what we can tell, without officially testing him, he's at the top of the Kiger-Jacob scale."

"I'm not surprised," she said. "I think he might read me as well, or maybe even better than Stacy can."

"And we come full circle to Stacy. I know you are somewhat aware of our New Convert program. Transfusion conversion and transfusion feeding from the start. Train them away from live-feeding. Nurture over nature."

"Yes, and I know you've had mixed success with the method, perhaps proving it to be marginally better than the traditional way."

"Yes, that is the  _common_  knowledge. But what I am to share with you is known by only a handful of my most trusted. Remy, Jonathan, Martha — Lisa Cuddy knows an abridged version of it — myself and, in a moment, you. Until we find the leaks, you must swear to me you will speak of this to no one without my express consent."

She nodded. "You have my word."

"Martha and I think we've stumbled onto a transfusion method that drastically reduces the drive to live-feed. It's centered around a theory we have about prerojen blood groupings and how they pair with normal human groupings. We've known for some time that, though we can consume any blood type, some pair up to work better than others to replenish our red count. And we know how the various mutations in the upír parasites make it easier for some people's systems to fight them off, while the same paired with another type would easily wreck the system of the potential host. While some rare combinations can cause rejection and even death, much the same as an improper blood transfusion for the uninfected."

"Yes, Eric. I've had prerojen biology 101," she said with a sigh and a roll of the eyes. Prompting him to get on to the meat of the matter.

"Fine, fine. I know. I get into professor mode and ramble. Long story short, we believe these types play a part in our attraction toward feeding from some people more than others. And we know our type is tied to the blood which infected us. But with Stacy and Mark, we altered the infected donor blood. Even they are unaware they are different in this way. We weren't even sure it would work, but they had a favorable blood type to start with, so we decided to diverge from the baseline — off the official record and away from prying eyes."

"What are you saying? That she has some kind of resistance to feeding?"

"Not in so many words. She has a neutral typing we've only theorized exists in maybe one in ten million, if it really exists in nature at all. And because of that, no particular flavor of blood attracts her more than another. So, while she's not immune to a desire to live feed, especially when her red count is low, she should never have to fight the overwhelming drives that come from someone highly compatible walking in the room and making her fangs threaten to drop. She has never felt the drive to consume blood while receiving her bi-weeklies. Both she and Mark have passed every test we've thrown their way. She, particularly, with flying colors." He boasted like a proud father. "It's the most promising step we've made since the idea of transfusions!"

Allison remained skeptical. She didn't trust herself and knew she was stronger willed than most prerojen. So, she didn't trust any of them to abandon live feeding completely. Prized science experiments or not. "And have you let her have a taste to see if she still remains your star?"

Eric scoffed, "That would defeat the purpose."

She leaned in, resting her arms on the table. "You know it's going to happen. House wants it too badly. He is covered in love-bites most the time. He wears them like badges of honor. If this thing takes, and from what I've seen it already has, how can you sit there believing she'll manage to keep  _both_  their urges from escalating for another three to five years while the committee decides what to do with him?

"I'm not just talking about her forgetting her job, falling in love and bonding with him before he even has a chance to choose it. That's bad enough morally, but he could end up infected with no interest in our cause, which, from what we know of his recreational habits could mean one more lovec unleashed on humanity. Or he ends up being expensive proof that your experiment has failed and he dies an emptied beverage."

"I have faith in her. And if I am wrong, you will be ensuring she stays on schedule with her transfusions, so he's still as safe with her recreationally feeding as any other of our kind we may send. No evaluation of this kind is without risk. You know this, but your attraction to this particular mark is clouding your logic."

"Perhaps. I hope, for his sake, that you are right. If he's everything we hope he is, we'd be wise to not screw this up."

* * *

### Chicago, Illinois. June 1st, 1865

Dr. Robert Chase had been working at Mercy hospital for just over two weeks. He not only worked there, but he'd been given a room in the hospital as well. It was a new concept for them. One he'd suggested himself when he applied. At his last position, in New York City, he'd also lived in the hospital. The logic being a live-in doctor would be more accessible during a late night emergency, rather than having to send out for a doctor every time.

Everyone had found it odd at first, but without fail, once they spoke with him about the practice, his passion won even the staunchest doubter over.

Allison has been spending time with Robert every evening for a week. After work, they would meet at her home for dinner. Tonight, he'd assigned her to work late and she wondered if work was really what he had on his mind.

He was always a complete gentleman, but she could see the fire hiding just below the surface. She was drawn to him, like no other person she'd ever met, almost like a moth to a flame. It wasn't something she could put her finger on. He was incredibly handsome, but it was so much more than his looks. It was something about the way he looked at her. It was almost palpable as if when he looked at her they shared a connection, and that made him extremely charismatic.

When he'd approached her to stay, she felt almost as if she were in a trance. The soft gentle tones of his voice pushing aside any apprehension she might have had. She busied herself with work, wondering if she'd read too much into his words, but soon found out her instincts were correct. Later in the night, he asked her to meet him in his quarters after her rounds. When she looked into his eyes, it was as if there could be no other answer than yes.

The idea of being with him felt thrilling and, on some level, a little dangerous. But that feeling might simply be due to the fact no woman of any standing wants to get labeled a whore, which she is quite sure the nuns would do. It would certainly cost her everything she's worked for and more.

Despite that, she had needs—needs that were certainly amplified around Robert. Perhaps tonight, when they were finally alone, he would show her his other side. The anticipation alone made her wet. They just had to be careful, as she had been during the war, but even more so now. She was at the perfect time in her cycle, had placed a womb veil earlier in the day, so she knew she could give herself to him with little fear of conceiving.

"Pssst. Over here." Robert whisper-yelled down the hall. Allison's head turned his way from where she'd been looking to ensure the coast was clear. With a smile she grabbed the hem of her dress and jogged toward the door he called out from. As soon as she was clear the door, he grabbed her by the waist and spun her around to face him. If she didn't know better she would swear his eyes had a real glow to them.

No sooner than she took note of it, he was kissing her. His lips claimed hers quickly, and expertly, his tongue demanding entrance, which she happily granted.  _Finally!_ She'd hoped his invitation was less than genteel. I had been too long since she'd tasted a man and Robert tasted wonderful. He smelled of spice which mixed with his intoxicating natural male musk and sent her already damp pussy into overdrive.

A moment later, he pinned her against the wall and with what seemed like no effort on his part, pulled her dress hem around her waist and lifted her up, wrapping her legs around his waist. "God, you are a fast trick!" He growled into her ear as a hand traveled back up one leg to the split in her pantaloons. Petting the soft covering of hair at her center caused him to groan; she was already dripping wet for him. "I was hoping ya came here lookin' for a little horizontal refreshment," he winked at her playfully. His hand left her center for a moment as he unfastened his breeches, releasing his hard cock. A moment later he buried it inside her and bit down on her neck, sucking hard as he fucked her.

She moaned lowly in his ear, spouting encouraging words as he pushed into her again and again. As he kissed her once more, she wondered why the flavor of his kiss had changed but she couldn't hold the thought as he reached a hand between them and began to stroke her clitoris in time with his thrusts. Her body jolted at the contact. She'd never had a man touch her in that way before. It was electric and a warmth radiated from where his fingers touched her, down her legs and up her stomach, until she felt herself falling over a precipice of pleasure.

The pleasure was so overwhelming she was on the verge of screaming, but Robert smothered her cries with a deep and desperate kiss. As she came over the peak, her body still convulsed against him. He smiled and looked her in the eye.

"That's it, Allison," he gently cooed to her, watching the last of the shock waves course over her. Once her breathing was calmer, he smiled and whispered in hotly in her ear, "Wanna g'over again?" She could only nod and kiss him in response as he continued to push into her against the wall.

A few moments later, he pulled her to him and carried her to his bed, still buried inside her and laid her over it. He stalled in his movement and she watched as his hands roamed the bodice of her dress. Through the cotton material, she could feel his fingertips, his nails as sharp as glass, as they seemed to claw at the material covering her. She felt warm air on her chest and briefly wondered how she was bare to him, how he'd opened her corset without it registering, but coherent thought ceased when he drove into her again, pushing her over the edge once more with his cock.

As she peaked the second time, he leaned forward and bit a hardened nipple, which sent a rush of pain and pleasure through her, just before he set to sucking it. Looking down she thought, briefly, she was bleeding. The thought was quickly dismissed as pleasure coursed through her and she laid back to revel in his continued attention to her breasts.

Yes, this was just what she had needed. She only hoped he wanted more from her than sex. But either way, at this moment, she was content.

* * *

### Chicago, Illinois. June 24th, 1865

Things couldn't be better for Allison. She, with many other women, had blazed a trail for the profession and there were talks of the young American Medical Association starting a formal nursing school.

In spite of this, a vast majority of nurses had no jobs to return to or simply wanted to return to a life closer to the one they knew before the war. Allison had fought hard to maintain her job and been lucky enough to be allowed to do so.

But despite all the things she'd accomplished, her eyes were on an even higher prize. She wanted to become a doctor, and today she became one step closer to that goal, having received her acceptance letter to enter into medical school. She would be one of only four women in her class and she had earned it by earning the respect of the doctors she worked with daily, absorbing far more of the medicine than most of her counterparts.

If she and the other women did well, it would open the door for more women to follow. It excited her to think she would be blazing a trail for future generations of women who wanted more from life than just to tend to home, family and charity drives. While all those things are important, she knew many women wanted a career as men have and the world was finally beginning to warm to the idea.

_It is a great time to be a woman!_ She often thought.

She had kept her application quiet. Only she and her sponsor, Dr. Francis Johnson whom Allison worked with and considered to be a mentor, knew of her dreams of leaving nursing to become a doctor. A nice man, nearing retirement, he had taken her under his wing as sort of a surrogate father and had been instrumental in helping enable Allison to continue nursing beyond the war.

She couldn't wait to tell Robert and hoped he'd be happy for her and wondered what it would mean to her dreams of also being a wife and mother. The nuns who run the hospital have told her, even of nursing, she'll have to choose 'a career.' That a woman's job is either in the home, or she must give up marriage and family to live in the world of men. Not a surprising mindset, given their own life choice to give up everything for Jesus. Yet most men make do with a career and family. Family money and her future income would surely afford her a nanny.

_Is it so wrong to want it all?_ Allison didn't believe so and hoped Robert felt the same.

Tonight they'd be celebrating a month of courting. Normally, to avoid any scandal, they met in her home under the watchful eye of the boarding house proprietor, Mrs. Randolph.

Mrs. Randolph was a kind widow in her late 60s who lost her husband to influenza 20 years prior. Her children were long moved out, two of her four sons died in the war. One of her widowed daughters-in-law lived in the large townhome with a teenage son. After the war, the elder lady opened the rest of her home to boarders to help make ends meet.

Mrs. Randolph had two bedrooms for let. One was occupied by Allison, the other was rented to Dr. Johnson. He suggested the home to Allison when she decided to sell her family's estate, rather than attempting to maintain it herself.

Beyond the one night, secretly sneaking into Robert's room, their relationship had been nurtured in the correct manner. Her willingness to engage with him in the carnal had not changed his formal courtship of her in the least. If anything, it seemed to fuel his desire to win her properly. Her family and first husband, all being passed on, not only left her with a respectable inheritance, it gave her a touch more freedom than the average woman in matters of love.

Tomorrow, was the official anniversary, but being Sunday, there would be few respectable places open to celebrate and they desperately wanted to break away from the watchful eye of Mrs. Randolph for another night. Tonight they planned on spending an evening on the town, taking in dinner and a play. She'd given her alibi to the older woman and her night was hers to spend with Robert. She'd been looking forward to it all week long. She had a suspicion that he might even ask her to marry him. She had no father and mother to win over, so if she was correct, after tonight, she may be one step closer to having everything she really wants from life.

Her only concern was  _Would Robert support this crazy doctor notion from a wife? His ideas about sex are, obviously, quite forward and his attitude toward me hasn't changed since that night. That has to be a favorable sign._

After tonight she'd know for sure. She'd get out front and tell him everything and give him a path of retreat if he needs to consider it or, if she is wrong about him completely, the opportunity to end the courtship before either gets in any deeper. It's only fair to be as honest as possible with him.

* * *

### Chicago, Illinois. June 25th, 1865

She had been right. Robert was truly excited about her news. She was so nervous telling him after their dinner, afraid she had read him wrong. But his smile broadened as she told him of her acceptance letter. Then he took her hand and told her he wanted her to become his wife. Gave her a ring, which she gladly accepted.

As they walked to the theater, he daydreamed aloud with her. "Perhaps we can open a husband and wife private practice. I've heard of a few others who have done it. It seems many women would be more comfortable being examined by another woman rather than a man."

"I'd like that, Robert. I want everything with you. Do you want children?" She asked, now wondering if perhaps he was so supportive because he didn't want a family in the way of his livelihood.

"I've always assumed I'd have children at some point, but if you think they would be in the way of your dream, I'm content without. The real question is 'Do you want children?' And if so, do you think we can manage it with both of us working?"

"I've always wanted a family of my own. I have money saved away. Our incomes will be such as to afford us a nanny."

"Then, if God is willing, we'll have children. I want everything for you, for us, Allison. I love you."

Looking around for nosy onlookers and finding none, he leans close to her ear and whispers, "And tonight, if you'll permit me the pleasure, I desire nothing more than to show you my love."

His words made her flush, and she whipped open her fan and began to cool herself. Glancing shyly over to him, she found him wearing a content, but smug grin as he offered his elbow to her.

* * *

### Princeton, New Jersey. Oct 16th, 2011

Allison sat at her kitchen table, woken again by dreams of a life long ago lived. Her mind had been bombarded with these memories since she started her new job.

Her breath heaved as she felt an old despair set in. The guilt for what she'd done. Logic told her it was foolish. No one had no control in those first waking moments. She didn't even remember them clearly. No one does. They were birthed into their new lives in a state of pure instinct to feed.

In the old days, when their maker saw fit to stick around and offer guidance, they were often offered a readied  _feast,_ a poor unknown victim, safely away from those they may care for. Not everyone knew their maker. Not that killing a random stranger should really make it all that much better, but the reality was, it did. At least her first victims were as good as dead. It was really the only comfort she had to cling to and maybe the only reason she was able to live through her guilt.

Many prerojen didn't bond to their creations. Some, especially in the days before the Coalition, converted the random victim for fun. The lovci, those who embraced the most base instincts of this disease — the hunters, still practiced this and many other brutalities. Others, mostly young rouges with no idea what they were, converted the odd victim out of an instinct they didn't even understand. Like ill-informed teenagers figuring out sex minus the talk about birds and bees.

Her maker was her husband. He'd infected her, so his note said, to save her life. She should have emerged from the frenzy to his guidance. To a love bond. Instead, she emerged a confused murderer with an instinctual knowledge of what she'd done, but no clear memory.

Her first clear memory was one of being covered in the blood of two men. Their bodies cold and white her mind giving only a flash of memories. Their screams. Biting into flesh and feasting. The taste of their blood. Finally being sated. The sudden realization of what she'd done, but absolutely no idea why or how.

No idea what she had become.

No idea how much she would hate what she had become.

Then finding the damned letter.

And the emptiness: the loss of husband and child. Not even remembering how the loss of the latter occurred. Robert had left the location of where she, a daughter she'd never meet or even see, was laid to rest. He outlined how he had to cut Allison open to deliver. How profusely she bled out. How it was too late for their daughter. How he couldn't save either and then, in his grief, how he'd cursed his beloved wife and disappeared to try to end his own life. Stating:

> _It is a near impossibility for one to inflict a wound those of our kind cannot recover from, but the wound in my soul cuts so deeply it never will be repaired, And so, I will find a way to inflict some literal wound to match and thus end cursed life. One hundred years have taught me there are only fleeting moments of normality and happiness to be found._
> 
> _My years with you were filled with such moments, and so, I nearly forgot my wretchedness. I acted in rash emotion when I changed you. I had never intended to inflict you with the curse of The Reborn. Perhaps, had events not turned the worse, I would have revealed my true nature to you and bid you decide. But now, that choice is destroyed and I am no better than my own maker, even if my reasons were nobler than his, the result is the same._
> 
> _I am a coward. I am sorry._

She never met Robert again. Perhaps he was successful in instituting his own demise. Perhaps he was a lovec who used her as a plaything, leaving her to struggle alone in her new life for his amusement. She stopped caring if she ever found out many years ago. Or so she thought.

She envied Stacy and the other experimental new converts, never having that kind of experience. They were turned in a lab. Strapped down to a hospital bed, well informed of what was to come. When they awoke they were fed the new way, via transfusion from the moment of awakening. Thrashing safely through the first feeding frenzy. Slowly coming back to themselves with a gentle voice reminding them of the procedure.

But it also made her fearful for Stacy and all ne-prerojen she interacted with. Especially for House. Sex and feeding go hand in hand for many. Neurologically, the drives produced many of the same endorphins and when the urges come full force there is little one can do to resist without intervention. Like being doped with Ecstasy times a million, all logical thought is pushed aside. There is feeding. Or, there is fucking. Or many times both. There is pure pleasure in both for the prerojen and, when frenzied, no regard left for the will of their  _partner_.

But as Eric often said, was it the chicken or the egg? Was the link to sex biological or there because it was a learned response? It didn't take long for those who didn't want to violently kill victim after victim to realize that seduction could provide a  _willing_  donor. Consuming small amounts of blood, more often, pushed aside the frenzy and allowed one more control over the dose they extracted. Phramonal response could calm and convince the uninfected of most anything. Over time more chose well-informed partners and needed no mind games. And so feeding, by way of sexual activities, became commonplace and no other way was known, for as long as any elder can remember.

But if they'd always had transfusion, would that link be so overwhelming or is it all just the years of endorphins being released together that creates their need for it? Eric loved the topic. He could and would debate it for hours on end.

All she knew, is the two were linked for  _her_  now. No man she'd ever been attracted to since turning had been safe from her desire to feed for long. So, as much as she was attracted to House, she was equally motivated to keep things platonic.

Looking back now, she knew Robert had used her in this way. So many moments she'd questioned only to look into his eyes and feel all doubt or curiosity melt away. She knew all too well now from the other side, but she often wondered just how many of her memories from then were truly her own. It was possible she may never know. Not all memories return, while others can and do. Like any buried memory she may never trigger them, or she might recover some missing piece 100 years from now because she smelled something associated with a memory, or crossed a street once familiar.

Whether he truly loved her or not, he gave her no say in her role as his pijača. If he had, perhaps she wouldn't be half as fucked up as she is now. She understood his need, so well now. But to marry her and live with her for years and use her all the while. It was hard for her to justify.

This is why she was grateful there were  _services_  available to fulfill her other needs. Experienced and professional pijača, many with special traits to help defend against her own. It was far safer that way. She would never allow herself to be with House because she wouldn't be able to resist having just a little taste, and one taste would never be enough, for either of them. And, worse yet, she could grow to love him… she couldn't risk it. If she fell in love with him how could she bear the consequences of any outcome — His murder, maker, or survivor?

She would rather be forever alone.


	10. To Kill the Pain

### Princeton, New Jersey. November 23rd, 2016. Early A.M.

It had been two months since House's first visit with Ronda. His plans of once a month were blown up after seeing Cameron that Monday after. After talking to her, and after Wilson's subsequent lectures, his needs and frustration surfaced quickly and he found he didn't care if it landed him in the poor house to sate them to a degree. He needed the physical release that he'd gotten from Ronda. Short of having Cameron, it was the only thing that had a shot of making him less miserable.

He'd been seeing Ronda twice a week since and only her. He booked in advance now to ensure it. It was lacking the connection he had with Cameron but, even without it, the sex was exactly what he craved. Even more, than he could have hoped for.

It would have to be enough.

And, surprisingly, he liked her and she liked him in those moments between sex. He supposed that made her the world's most expensive fuck-buddy.

"You have plans for Thanksgiving?" she asked as they shared a post-fuck cigarette.

"Na. My mom wants me to come with her and Dad to my aunt's. I hate holiday family gatherings enough in a normal year, but fuck if I'll be caught dead south of the Mason-Dixon after those assholes voted in Trump." He emphasized his disdain as he tapped out his cigarette hard into the ashtray lying on the bed between them.

She smirked and teased him. "I figured you'd be all about him. You're always spouting off asshole things."

He huffed. "Yeah, well, I wouldn't expect to be elected president for saying them. I'm an asshole because I  _don't_  want to be in charge of a bunch of people and important shit. That, and I can figure out more about a person if I rile them up a — "

House sat up quickly and grabbed his thigh, "Urhhh goddammit! Fucking… mother fucker!"

Ronda put out her smoke, moved the ashtray to the nightstand and sat up beside him to stroke his long back. "Seems like it's getting worse." They'd never mentioned his leg or his pain directly before. He'd tried to fake his way through it, but he'd found during their long nights together that Ronda was as observant as he was. She noticed but never had reason to do more than observe until now.

He decided there was no reason to not be straight with her. "Mmm. Yeah. 'Cause I've been decreasing my dose of Vicodin trying to find the right balance. It's great for the pain in my leg, but a pain for my dick. I have to take Viagra to make sure I can even stay hard when I take more than my normal dose of Vicodin. So then I'm hard, but it feels pretty numb. Which, if I were the one getting paid for the fucking, would be great. But since I'm the one paying, I'd really rather feel the awesome things I'm paying you to do."

"Lie down," she commanded. He shot her a look and was just about to tell her to stop pitying him but he saw no pity in her aura. So, curious, he did as he was told.

She straddled him and looked him dead in the eye. "We all have scars, just some are easier to see than others. Breath slowly. In through your nose out through your mouth. Focus on me."

She placed her hands on his shoulders and held him to the bed while she breathed in a slow tempo. He obeyed following her pace, eyes locked on hers as she exuded a calming purple energy. For a moment, the pain dulled slightly.

She gave him a curious look. "How  _did_  you end up here?"

"I took US 27," he answered with a smirk.

She raised an eyebrow and shook her head slowly. "You really have no idea what you are, do you?"

He thought about a smart-ass thing to say but another flash of pain and heat overtook his body, centering from his right thigh. He groaned instead. His tone became pleading. "I'm not even sure what you mean enough to come up with a sarcastic remark for that question. Look, they take my Vicodin at the door. I don't know if you can go get it, or if you might have drugs to go along with the other things in that 'favorites' drawer… It's not going to get better and I don't think I can make it home on my bike in this kind of pain even if you did give me a refund for the rest of the night."

His head laid back and he closed his eyes and gritted his teeth. He no longer cared if she pitied him or not, so long as she could get him anything to help kill the pain. He berated himself in his mind.  _You stupid fuck. You should have known you'd need more than one to make it more than a round with her. She's a fucking spectacular athlete. You're a cripple who used to stay in shape._

Her voice interrupted his thoughts. "We have something, but it's not for our clients. If you want it, you have to trust me. No questions. And you have to promise to keep the fact I gave it to you in this room. I will get worse than fired if you don't. And… I don't think you really want to find out what will happen to you."

At first, he thought she was making some kind of joke, but he opened his eyes and could see the concern in her aura. Whatever this drug she had was, she believed it would help and she believed that they were in danger if anyone knew she gave it to him. He was in too much pain to care about the puzzle for once.

"Okay. Whatever it is, just give it to me. It won't leave this room."

She could see he meant it. She also knew that he'd mean just about anything with the amount of pain radiating from him. It was a risk, but in the end, she liked him and she hated that he was in pain.

Swinging her left leg over him, she dismounted and climbed out of the bed. She didn't even bother getting dressed and left the room. His legged throbbed and it seemed like she was gone for an age. When she finally returned, she had a medium sized chest. Placing it on the foot of the bed, she dug through it, tossing various sex toys out on the bed before digging out a vile and two syringes with different needle sizes.

With a pained expression, he looked on curiously, trying to figure out just what drug she was about to shoot into him. It was too dark in the room away from the bedside lamp for him to get a good look. She was also partially obscured by the lid of the chest.

"Two ways to do this. I put it in your arm intravenously, it'll dull the pain and you'll feel like your on a candy flip. I'm guessing you're the kind of guy that knows what that is."

He nodded, "I was a college student in the 90s. Acid and Ex. Every sensation, physical and mental heightened times a hundred. Pretty amazing, as I recall."

"Indeed it is. The second option is in the center of your thigh muscle. That'll kill the pain nearly instantly. You might even feel like it's normal for a few hours. You may get a little high from it eventually, but it works its way into your system too slowly to really cause much of a trip. Either way, it'll do what you need. It'll get you through the night and you'll be coming down in about 6 hours."

"Sounds like it's just what the doctor ordered. Maybe you've got a naughty nurse outfit in there that you can use while you administer my medication."

He was sweating and looked miserable despite his playful banter. Ronda shook her head at him. "You don't look like you really want to wait for me to go play dress up. So you'll have to pretend you're in a nudist hospital," she joked.

He smiled, despite the pain. "Even better. I'll have to suggest that to my boss sometime. She has a great rack. I'm sure we could get all kinds of donors interested with them on full display."

She smirked but quickly became serious once more. "You'll find it doesn't leave you hungover the next day, but it's kind of like acid in that you might feel some lingering after effects. But I do warn you, unlike acid, you'll want it again after a couple of hours down. That'll pass in a day, two tops, if you let it. And you'll have to because you'll fuck everything up if you come here looking for it. But if by some stretch of the imagination you figure out how to get your hands on it, it's not something you want to be hooked on. For so many reasons beyond simple physical or mental addiction. Trust me, I know far too well."

He nodded curtly. "If you were me, which would you do?"

"If I were wise I'd say the leg, but a good hard fuck on this high is about the best thing you'll ever feel. So, I'd take it in a vein. In fact, I'll join you if you do."

"In the vein it is," in truth, he'd already known that was really the only choice he was interested in. He was weak when it came to getting a good high, even weaker when it came to a good puzzle. "And…  _it,_ you can't tell me what it is? Really?"

"No questions. You agreed. I've told you far more than I should've already. This is an enormous risk for me. And you for that matter. So either take it, shut up and enjoy, or, I'll walk out and send the boys up with your Vicodin and they can call you an Uber. Your choice."

"Christ, Ron! You know what I choose. I trust you know how to find a vein?"

* * *

Cameron had been fighting off a migraine that night. She knew it meant House was in pain. It started as a dull hum. She also knew he was with the whore again, but thankfully it was becoming less intense with each visit. His physical needs were being held in check now. She was thankful his mind had begun to stop replacing the young half-breed with her image for much of the session. Though, there were always the moments near the climax.

She was happy about this small bit of comfort for him. It was exactly why she'd paid the service to drop the hint of the place within his earshot. She knew he needed more and she knew he'd be too curious to resist. It had, as she had hoped, made the urges for both of them more bearable. But tonight his pain was making her long for him. Long to comfort him.

Then suddenly, in a flash of warmth, the pain was gone. It was so intense she had to excuse herself mid-stitch. "Conney, could you tie this last suture?"

Her assistant looked up at her with concern but knew better than to ask with the patient right there. So she simply nodded and took the tools from Cameron.

Cameron excused herself and made a b-line for her office. She barely made it inside and to her couch before images overwhelmed her. "No, please no," she mumbled to herself as she sunk into the couch and let the imagery take over.

_House lay in his bed. His apartment was a shambles. Missing things from the walls, atop dressers and cabinets. The closet was open and more than half empty. Cameron was sure if she snooped and opened the dresser drawers she'd find half of the drawers bare. He hadn't cleaned or straightened a thing since Stacy's things were removed._

_Wilson had been staying with him, but he'd been kicked out for offering to clean. House wanted none of his pity-party fare removed. How could he wallow in it otherwise? She knew this was going to be a particularly harsh memory jog when they'd agreed to it. But the supporting material was all the more crushing. And she felt it now as if the emotion were her own._

_She was halfway to the bed by the time he registered her. "Cameron? Why the hell are you here?"_

_Looking around she spied a spare dining chair covered in clothes. She took it and pushed off the clothing and sat down at House's bedside. He was covered to his waist with a single light blue sheet. She could easily see he was naked underneath. "I'm here to examine your leg since you refuse to do any of your follow-ups with the surgeon." He didn't have a surgeon. Only her and Cuddy to clean up Stacy's mess. But he didn't know that. Even the surgeon didn't know that. To them, he'd had a chunk of his thigh removed without his consent by said surgeon and on Cuddy's suggestion to Stacy and with her approval._

_She pushed the sheet up and over his right leg revealing his thigh to her. The sutures she'd put there crisscrossed in stark contrast to his skin. She was amazed her idea had worked at all. Looking at the aftermath, she was being to wonder if she'd done him a favor by saving him. Perhaps instead, it was twice the damage done._

_As she gently touched and examined him, her mind filled with intense erotic imagery. His hand slipping down into her naked lap. His fingers caressing the soft hair of her sex before giving it a playful tug._

_It felt so real she glanced down fully expecting to somehow be naked. But she was clothed and his hand had never left the bed. As her eyes returned to her examination she saw the sheet move slightly and found his penis had hardened and was twitching under the sheet. The shape of the head clearly outlined, the sheet was moistened from his pre-cum enabling her to see more definition._

_Goddamn. It was hot. She was suddenly hot. Her mind drifted again. She imagined herself standing and stripping off her clothes. She climbed over him and watched him watch her stroke her clit._

_He groaned from the bed and she focused back on the real. Then she made the mistake of looking into his eyes. The pleading look, the hunger. His aura was bright red with a nearly white center. His scent filled the room. Fuck it was driving her mad with need. And her reaction was making her angry. Angry at herself for having no control. Pissed that she'd gone too far trying to save him and now their connection was amplified 1000 fold._

_Her hand traveled across his thigh and up under the sheet. Finding her mark she pumped and he groaned. "Allison. Goddamn."_

_He was magnificent. His face changed from despair to euphoria. "Take off your clothes. Now," he commanded._

_She pumped once more and then dropped his cock so she could obey. "Go slow." He commanded once more. Cameron slowly raised her shirt, still seated. Her flat stomach revealed inch by inch. His finger trailing the hem until her arms came to her breasts. There his fingers stopped as she took off the rest of the garment. His middle and index fingers hooked around the front of her bra and yanked it up to barely free her nipples._

_Then he pinched her left one hard. Pulled. Twisted. "Owwuuhh," she moaned and nearly came in her pants._

_He could feel it. He could smell it. He could see it in his mind. "Take off your pants. Your cum belongs on my face and not your pants. I need you on my face Allison. Now. I'm going to bite your clit and drink you. I can feel how much you want me to."_

_His mental projections were so strong, they could both feel it as if he'd already done it. He nearly came and she chuckled. "See how hard it is?"_

_"Fuck yes, it's hard."_

_"Sit on my face Allison. Let me make you forget how broken you are. Make me forget how broken I am. "_

_She stood, toed off her shoes and socks and pushed down her pants, dancing out of them as the tight fabric refused to free the last few inches of her legs. He chuckled and scooted down, making more room for her to straddle his face. A moment later she settled in on top of him and he wrapped his arms around her hips and yanked her hard to his mouth and licked._

_A pleasure unlike any she'd felt ran through her. Having him there beneath her was right. More right than anything she'd ever experienced. Even though her logical mind believed his love to be a side effect of the treatment, her body betrayed her. "Do what you promised, Greg. Bite it. Make me bleed. I need you to taste me."_

_House needed no more confirmation of desire. He bit into her hard and she screamed and writhed and instinct bid her flee, but he held her in place and licked the mingled fluids dripping from her sex._

_She pushed and he pulled. She yanked on his hair and pounded his crown with her fists. Her hunger was surfacing and she needed to taste him—merge with him mentally and physically. "Greg, I want to taste you. Let me fuck you. Let me feed on you."_

_By all rights, he should have been terrified. But he didn't remember how giving into this desire before caused him to lose damn near everything. He didn't remember what she really was. What Stacy really was. What he really was. She should have told him again, but she didn't dare, now her need for him had overwhelmed her. She went on pretending, pushing away the fact his consent was not informed and this was not what they'd agreed to._

_He pushed her down from his face roughly. "I don't have the legs to fuck you like I want like you deserve, so sit on me and take what you need. I want you to use me. Hurt me and leave me raw. I want you to scratch me. Bite me. Make me bleed. Break the skin so I don't feel so broken."_

_She impaled herself with his cock and writhed against him. Her fingernails, though short, dug ten half-moons into his chest. After a moment she leaned forward and her mouth found his neck. It was pure instinct. Her fangs lowered piecing him and she sucked hard on the wound to extract his life essence into hers. She reveled at his flavor. All the while her hips worked to rob his cock of its essence. She was high on him._

_Her blood was beginning to affect him as well. Suddenly, he felt strong and flipped her over and drove into her all the while she stayed latched on. "Good girl… god you are freak! Suck me dry. Fuck you are so hot now. My whole body's burning."_

_Oh, how part of her did want to suck him dry, but there was still some sane part of her left that stopped when the blood from his wound began to coagulate. He came an instant later, she came hard against him. She raked her tongue over a fang and licked his wound with her own blood until the bleeding stopped and the prick marks turned to light pink dots. By morning, even they would be gone. And he would have no physical evidence how she'd lost control with him. Used him and left them both wasted._

"What the fuck was that?" She said aloud to herself as her mind focused back to her office. The whole thing had felt so real. "But that's not what happened." Not entirely anyway. Not after his first thought of her naked. She'd examined his leg and left him there. She remembered clearly because it was one of the hardest things she'd ever had to do — to leave him there hard and wanting, naked and delicious under a sheet.

She covered her face with her hands, sobbing with guilt. "That's not what happened."

But she'd be damned if it didn't now feel as if it had happened in exactly that way. "No, no, no. That is not what happened." She repeated as if the matra would cleanse her soul.


	11. Still in the Darkness

### In the darkness. At a time unknown.

Still, dark.

Tap. Tap. Tap.  _She fucked him. She fucked the devil to punish me._  Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap. . Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap. . Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap. . Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap. . Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap. . Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap. . Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap. . Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap. . Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap. . Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap. . Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap. . Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap. . Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap. . Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap. . Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap. . Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap. . Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap. . Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap. . Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap. . Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap. . Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap. . Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap. . Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap. . Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap. . Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap. . Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap. . Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap. . Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap. . Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap. . Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap. . Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap. . Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap. . Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap. . Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap. . Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap. . Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap. . Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap.

Still, cold.

Tap. Tap. Tap.  _She fucked him. She fucked the devil to punish me._  Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap. . Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap. . Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap. . Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap. . Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap. . Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap. . Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap. . Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap. . Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap. . Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap. . Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap. . Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap. . Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap. . Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap. . Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap. . Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap. . Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap. . Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap. . Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap. . Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap. . Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap. . Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap. . Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap. . Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap. . Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap. . Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap. . Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap. . Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap. . Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap. . Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap. . Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap. . Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap. . Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap. . Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap. . Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap. . Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap. . Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap.

Still, alone.

Tap. Tap. Tap.  _She fucked him. She fucked the devil to punish me._  Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap. . Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap. . Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap. . Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap. . Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap. . Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap. . Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap. . Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap. . Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap. . Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap. . Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap. . Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap. . Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap. . Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap. . Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap. . Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap. . Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap. . Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap. . Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap. . Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap. . Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap. . Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap. . Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap. . Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap. . Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap. . Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap. . Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap. . Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap. . Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap. . Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap. . Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap. . Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap. . Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap. . Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap. . Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap. . Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap. . Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap.

He'd taken to tapping on the side of his prison. A daily drone to pass the uncountable expanse of time he'd been there. His body had withered away to nearly nothing.

He no longer thought about that. It had been years since his once sharp mind had focused on the attrition of his body. About how many times he'd awoke from and entered into a hibernation survival state. Or about how long he'd have to endure before his body would not be able to mend itself from starvation.

It had been forever since he remembered exactly how the devil had put him here. All he knew was his love had fucked the devil to punish him.

The devil had put a tube into the box prison. From it, the imprisoned man sometimes drank rainwater. It let in enough oxygen, but the air was still so very stale. It'd been years since it had stunk to him. It had been years since he wondered if that was because he had nothing more to ooze from him or because he'd simply gotten used to the odor.

Long spans of time would pass. He knew not how long and then he would catch the faint smell of the devil. Then the blood rain would come. It was just enough to start the cycle of starvation all over again. He'd long since lost count of the iterations. Long since lost the will to try to refuse to drink. He didn't think about the blood rain any longer or the hunger in between. He simply drank when it did.

In truth, the only things he thought about now was the tapping, her, and the devil. Just:

Tap, tap, tap.

_Her, her, her, fucking the devil._

Tap. Tap. Tap.  _She fucked him. She fucked the devil to punish me._  Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap. . Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap. . Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap. . Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap. . Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap. . Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap. . Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap. . Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap. . Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap. . Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap. . Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap. . Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap. . Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap. . Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap. . Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap. . Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap. . Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap. . Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap. . Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap. . Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap. . Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap. . Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap. . Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap. . Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap. . Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap. . Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap. . Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap. . Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap. . Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap. . Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap. . Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap. . Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap. . Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap. . Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap. . Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap. . Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap. . Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap.

Tap.

Tap.

Tap.

Tap.

The earth quaked around him.

Tap.

There was a loud unnatural moan and scrape. He stopped tapping.

"Hey, Johnny! You were right. That tube must have been another one of those safety coffin things. I think we've uncovered another unmarked grave! Careful now! We'll dig the rest by hand and move it over with the others for transport."

There were shoveling and scraping noises and the box began to move.

And there was a beam of blinding light blazing in through a small hole where the tube had been a second earlier.

And there was warmth beginning to radiate into the box.

And he wasn't alone.

And now, he remembered: He was still  _starving_.


	12. Escalation

### Princeton, New Jersey. July 2nd, 2012

**Late A.M.**

"You want to move in with him?" Allison asked in surprise as she prepared Stacy's transfusion.

Stacy was seated on the examination bed in the small clinic room. The right sleeve of her dress shirt was rolled up to her bicep as she waited. She raised an eyebrow but maintained an even tone and aura as she replied, "I take it you don't approve of the idea?"

"No. I do not," Allison answered as she tied off Stacy's arm and felt for her vein, "I think it's foolhardy and far beyond the bounds of your assignment." She wiped down the area and inserted the I.V. as Stacy continued.

"He'll pull away if I reject him. The fact I asked him for a couple of days to think about it pissed him off. He was upset that I didn't want to move in with him after the first week which was a perfectly reasonable decision on my part. After a year, I think it would be unusual if we  _didn't_  move in together. Something like that would either make him suspicious or just push him to end the relationship. I don't want to have to influence his mind if it's not urgent to keep him from figuring out what we are."

"We'll in that we are in agreement. We'll understand him best that way." Having everything in place, Allison started the flow of blood into Stacy's arm and stripped off her gloves with a snap, and tossed them in the hazard bin. "And the council, do they still not have what they need to proceed? He's not going to change. There's not much more to know about him. He's brilliant and I agree with Cuddy in that I think he's worth the extra effort. He has a right to be included if we continue. Open his eyes to the truth and maybe then we'll get what we need for the council to decide if they offer him conversion."

Stacy's aura tinted with a calm contented purple as the parasites in her blood began to process the donor blood. "I agree, but every time I push for it the elders accuse me of impatience. For them, a few years must seem like a moment. They think the wise move is to watch him for a few more years. Present him with more strange little tests. Observe and report."

"I've encountered similar attitudes when I suggest we include him. It's as if they forget that ne-prerojen are fragile and don't have all the time in the world. If we don't convert him, which I still hope we don't, those two years might make a difference in his ability to find a treatment or even a cure. What do they think of his invitation to escalate your relationship?"

"Winters says it was a mixed reaction but enough were in favor for him to leave the decision to me. Only Tritter is adamantly against it. No shocker there, since he's adamantly against just about every inclusion these days because of security. Greg's especially, given he's not much on rule breakers."

"Tritter. I've heard the name, but haven't met him."

"He transferred last month after Davis was assigned to London. He's got a reputation as a hard-ass. From what I've seen it's been earned. Since he's taken over Counterintelligence things have been locked down like a vice. Lots of tension. Audits everywhere. He fired Davis's whole team and replaced them with his own people."

Allison leaned back against the counter in the small clinic room and sighed. "I haven't spoken with Eric in a few months but in the last year, he's often indicated the leaks are getting worse than is commonly known. I guess strong measures are needed."

Stacy nodded in agreement. "Tritter's got that in spades. Eric and Remy respect but dislike him. They're dealing with it because something has to be done to stop the leaks and Tritter's a man who gets things done."

"And you? Do you wish to move in with House because you believe it's critical to your job or because you've fallen in love with him? Would it be a bad thing to end it now and observe his reaction? If you don't love him, you should cut him loose from the idea of it. If you do, then I think you should ask the council to reassign you and stop tangling your personal and professional life."

"You know I love him. You read me too well not to. And so, I infer from your asking the question at all you'd have me resign this assignment."

"I am impressed that you've proven to be strong-willed enough to maintain control over your urges to feed thus far. But to continue to with him under these conditions isn't fair to either of you. I know him well enough to know what his reaction will be if you let things persist. You are losing your ability to be impartial. Cut ties with one thing or the other. Grow up and decide which you'd rather have, this job or a relationship with House. Continuing as you are isn't fair to both and can only lead to great hurt."

"I know you're trying to give me good advice, but let's be honest. You want this assignment. You've hated the way I've been doing it from the start. And, though I don't read you quite so well as you read me, I'm pretty sure that if you had the chance you'd bed him just a quickly as I did. So, save me the self-righteous, caring Dr. Cameron act, Allison. No one on the council shares your concerns, or at least not the ones concerning our sex life, so please, if you don't mind, back the fuck off from that aspect our relationship and focus on Greg's professional assets and I'll tend to his personal ones."

* * *

**Mid Evening.**

House was over the moon with excitement. Stacy had said yes to his invitation. She was elated knowing she had caused the colors in his aura to dance. As they washed dinner dishes she began to discuss the logistics of the move. "We should get a bigger place. Or just move into my place."

"Fuck that," House replied, obviously opposed the idea. "I like my apartment. You like my apartment. It's been fine for both of us. It's not like you were ever at your high-rise-waste-of-perfectly-good-weed-money condo anyway. If you liked it so much, why are you always over here and not demanding I  _come_  over there."

"Point taken," she conceded. She didn't really have an attachment to the place, after all. "I guess it is a little sterile."

"Sterile?" He mocked. "It's like a fucking clean-room. I always feel like I should strip and put on my hazmats in the foyer so I don't infect the place with my man cooties."

"Ha. Ha. We could still find a place somewhere in the middle. Warm and cozy like your place but with an office and guest room."

"Who the hell do we need a guest room for? Wilson? We'd never be rid of him between marriages if we made him that comfortable. Your friends aren't the kind that come to you for a place to crash. My folks would never bother staying with us because Dad. Your folks are dead. We're both only children. It would just be a room to collect shit. As for an office, it's called your lap, in any room in the house because laptop-with-wifi."

"God, you are a piece of work," she splashed some water his way, but he managed to dodge it, with a smile. She handed him a dish and he set to drying it, smirking all the while as he replied, "As God, I order you, my minion, to drop to your knees and work my piece to celebrate your commitment to me."

"Make me," she challenged with a matching smirk. Her aura heated up in an instant and House felt his cock twitch at the idea of forcing her to suck it.

"Dammit. I really liked your outfit," he mused mostly to himself as he tossed down the drying towel and grabbed ahold of her by her blouse, pushing her away from the skink. Her hands dripped with suds and water as he tossed her against the counter and ripped open her shirt. Buttons flew to every corner of the kitchen as he yanked down the material and used it to secure her arms behind her. "Don't want your dishpan hands to get in the way of the spectacular blowjob you are about to give me."

She always got a rush from riling him. Urging on his baser side. He knew it. He fed off her momentary adrenaline rush from that first moment of wondering if this time he really would hurt her in a bad way. The flicker of fear in her aura always lit sometime up he was almost afraid of. And yet, it felt so fucking good and made him so fucking hard. He grabbed her hair and pulled back angling her face to his for a searing kiss that ended with him biting and tugging her lip with his teeth.

She moaned as he increased the pressure. God how she wanted him to do all the things he desired, but she steeled her resolve. He sensed the shift in her aura and let her lip loose. "One day, baby. One day you'll figure out how good that pain can be. I can wait for it. But what I can't wait for is to feel your throat around my cock."

He pushed her to her knees and rubbed his jean covered, hardened shaft against her face. "Bite it," he commanded and she bit him through the thick material.

He groaned with pleasure. "One day I'll convince you to do that properly too. I know you want it, deep... down... on the inside. I promise it'll be good, baby… I want you to make me bleed."

"Greg, please, I can't—" He grabbed her hair again and put his hand over her mouth. "Shut the fuck up. Your mouth has better things to do." His aura was white hot with need. Her labia moistened and the fluid soaked into her panties. She loved him most when he was rough and demanding. She could only imagine how powerful he would be if infected. How helpless he would make a pijača with simply with a look.

She also knew, deep down, I.V. feeding wouldn't be enough for him, but as he thrust his cock, deep down, into her throat, she found she didn't care. She wanted him. She wanted her lifetime with him. She wanted him to have what he desired, even if she couldn't give it to him.

She wanted just as much to be proof that prerojen could overcome their base drives, as much as she knew House never would.

She just had to figure out how to convince the council he would be loyal — most importantly how to convince Tritter. Then House could do the work they needed and she could fully bond with him and live the next few thousand years helping him get all he desired.

* * *

### Atlanta, Georgia. July 3rd, 2012

Michael Tritter sat on a park bench beside his most trusted cover operative, Raphael Garcia. Raphael was a handsome man who appeared to be in his late thirties with olive skin, a full black beard, and long dark hair pulled back into a neat ponytail. His arms were covered in tattoos as was his body beneath his form-fitting black t-shirt and ripped jeans. He was well toned and on the muscular side. He looked like a biker with expensive taste and carried himself like a prince.

Tritter, by contrast, was plain. Neither handsome nor ugly. Neither well toned nor fat. He possessed a tall, strong build and stature that begged most who encountered him to not test him. He appeared to be in his mid-forties with grey hair cropped short as if he was in the military. He wore a dark suit that was neither cheap nor expensive.

The two men, though seemingly an odd couple, had worked side by side for perhaps two thousand years. They'd lost count long ago. Both projected auras of the deepest violet and gave away nothing to the other, or anyone for that matter. It's one of the reasons they were so well suited for their life's work.

One of many reasons.

"Raphael, I have an important task for you."

"Speak it, Michael. It shall be done."

"There is a doctor the council seeks to include, perhaps even convert. I want you to watch him and the agent Stacy Miller — the science experiment they sent to fuck him. His name is Gregory House. You will find him working at Princeton Plainsboro Teaching Hospital in Princeton, New Jersey. I secured you a position there in security. No one from this department is informed of your cover there. The manager is one of our men and will serve as your handler. He will make sure you are assigned to the areas you need to be in order to accomplish your job. Your secure document exchange will have a folder with everything you need to know about him, their operation, and yours. You start work on Friday."

"I'll go at once and prepare."

"There's another detail. There is one other doctor there that helps with the House case from time to time. She works in damage control but she's listed as an advisor to Miller. She sometimes aids Lisa Cuddy with reporting on House's professional assets. Allison Cameron is her current name, Allison Chase is her historical record name. She's one of the Formans' former wards. Keep an eye on her as well."

Raphael raised an understanding eyebrow, "Yes, sir. Anything, in particular, I should watch for?"

"I want to know more about where she stands. If she knows more than she should. I'm also curious about her interactions with Dr. House."

"Sir." Raphael bowed his head slightly, stood and started to walk away.

Tritter called out and Raphael turned back to him, "This stays between you and me. No one is to know."

"I understand completely, Michael," and with his confirmation, he turned and walked away.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So between the holidays and the fact I've caught up with myself, at least on this section of the story, updates will be coming a little slower for a month or two. Sorry about that as much if not more than you folks are. For some reason, I can't seem to write this in story order. I keep getting ideas for things I'm not ready for and writing them so I don't forget them. Oh, well. One has to go with the muse.
> 
> But I am pretty all over the place for the next two months physically as well. So please bear with me. I'm still writing, just not as quickly as any of us would like and I don't want to suffer quality for speed. If by some chance I don't get to make an update before, I hope those of you who celebrate Christmas have a great one and happy holidays to all the rest of ya'll.


	13. The Unlit Corners of The Mind

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Note: I goofed up the date of the Tritter/Raphael scene last chapter. It took place in 2012 the same time as the rest of the chapter. I made a copy/paste error. Hopefully, it wasn't too confusing and not too hard to place in the right timeline. I've updated it since but wanted to let those of you who saw it the other way know.
> 
> Since I had to make that note I have a few more things. Firstly, thanks for waiting around for this one. Not only did the holiday happen, but I had two computers stolen from me a few days after my last update. Both my personal and my employer's computer along with some other stuff. :/ - Totally sucks.
> 
> I can't afford a replacement at the moment, so I had to drag out an ancient PC and resurrect it just to be able to check email and things like that. Not to mention writing. It's slow as hell, and can't do much, but at least it's working. The whole mess made for a shitty Christmas break.
> 
> I did, at least, still get a real vacation after the new year. So, it wasn't all bad. And hopefully, I'll have more time now to get back on track here. :)
> 
> Also, thanks to astavares for giving this a once over to ease my paranoia. One of these days, my friend, we will somehow figure out this timezone problem. It's not quite the same writing without you.
> 
> Now, on with the story.

### Princeton, New Jersey. November 23rd, 2016.

Cameron awoke from a fitful sleep. The vision of fucking House had unnerved her. She lay in bed staring at the ceiling wondering just what had happened. Getting pulled into his mind wasn't unusual. In fact, it was a regular occurrence over the past two years.

But this, this was different. It was —

A loud knock at her door pulled her from her thoughts. She sighed and shouted out a "Coming," as she sat up and swung her legs over the side of the bed. Clad in her black cami and loose pajama pants she made her way to the front of her apartment.

She opened the door and met a pair of blue eyes. She greeted the man there. He smirked. She stepped aside and let him in, leaving the door open. "It's been far too long, Allison."

Taking a step toward him, she was washed over with a sense of calm.

He smiled. "Lead me to your bed. When we get there, take off your clothes."

Allison turned and lead the man to her bed and took her clothes off. As he looked on her naked body standing beside her bed, his cock strained. He loved the next part. Even after thousands of years, it never got old. "Get in the bed. No matter what you will not cry out. You will not leave the bed. Understand? No matter how afraid you are or how much I hurt you, you will not cry out. You will not leave the bed."

"I understand."

"Good girl. Now up, in the bed. I've got a treat for us first."

A tall, lanky, young man entered the room. He was clad in dark pants and a white button-down, which contrasted his dark skin. He had a small dark backpack with a bicyclist's helmet hanging from the side. His aura was white hot and pulsed in time with his heart, his scent overwhelmed her and caused her mouth to water and her fangs to drop. He stared at her with a blatant desire. She laid back and spread open her legs.

The older man chuckled, "Yes. You know this game, Allison. I played it with you once before, many years ago. Only then, you played a different role. It's your turn to let your animal loose while I watch. But make sure you save some for me. In fact, I want you to cover yourself in his blood, once you've drunk your fill of course. I'll have my snack served from your lovely flesh. It'll help you remember the first time I licked your body clean."

"Do you have a name?" She asked the young man.

"Cole," he answered simply.

"I'm Allison, Cole. I'd like to get to know you better. Take off your clothes and come join me."

Despite his obvious desire, he looked to the older man. "It's okay Cole. I want you to lie with her. You will be doing this for my glory and the glory of my Father."

Cole nodded and began to unfasten his pants. A moment later he was fully naked. His long thick cock bobbed from his thin but toned frame. "Cole, take this blade. This sacrifice requires blood."

Cole took the handle of a dagger that looked as if it belonged in a museum. The handle was shaped in gold with the markings from hand tooling. The grip was smoothed and matted from centuries of use. The blade seemed smaller than it should have been, whittled down from many sharpenings. It looked razor sharp.

"Cut your chest, Cole. In a cross, for your Lord. Then cut the inside of her thigh. When you finish, give me back my dagger, lick her clean, and fuck her as you desire."

Cole did as instructed, cutting himself first the length of his sternum, then from nipple to nipple. Allison watched patiently, groaning lowly and touching herself as his blood began to flow and the smell of iron permeated the room.

She spread herself even wider as Cole approached her and ran the blade down the inside of her right thigh. All the while, streams of blood were beginning to trickle down his chest and stomach.

Having cut them both he handed the blade back to his master and dropped to his knees. The elder man licked the blade and smiled as his cock strained again against his pants.

He knew he'd free it soon enough, but he did so love foreplay.

He found a chair and pulled it up to watch. Cole didn't hesitate to lick the long bleeding cut on Allison's leg, then plunged his tongue into her wet core. She grabbed the sheets and thrust her hips into his face. He responded by sucking her clit hard and stroking his cock, which was now lubricated with the blood streaming down his torso.

Allison's first orgasm hit after only a couple of minutes of attention and with it, her hunger rose. She moved so quickly Cole didn't know what hit him. She threw him against the bed and licked his chest then down lower to his cock. She smiled up at the young man, her face smeared now in his blood and grabbed his long shaft with one hand and stroked him as she sucked the tip.

His blood was fueling her fire. She fought the urge to bite into his thick prick because she wanted to fuck it first. After licking and sucking it clean she moved back up his body, licking more of his blood as she went then mounted him without pause.

He groaned in pleasure, "Oh, you feel so tight. So, wet."

The older man chuckled, "Better than you imagined, I suspect. Aren't you glad that I didn't need you to wait for a wife any longer? Her pussy is one of the best I've ever fucked, in fact. And I've had just about every kind this world has to offer. Only the best for my good and faithful servant, Cole."

"Thank you. Jesus, she's so…" Cole moaned.

"Yes, she is," the older man confirmed.

It was then Allison lay on him and bit into his neck. It was not a loving bite, given to a beloved lover. It was a savage and hungry bite and red liquid spurted around her face as she drank, all the while fucking him.

He opened his mouth to scream but he couldn't. Something inside him wouldn't allow it. His eyes grew wide with terror as he struggled to escape. He pushed her to the side, strengthed from the dose of her blood, and jumped from the bed staggering to his master while Allison stayed in the bed looking on in lust.

The older man simply unzipped his pants and began to stroke himself. Cole watched in horror, but could not cry out. He tried to move but was growing too weak. The man stood then and grabbed the hand Cole was pressing to his wound and pulled it away. The man then buried his face in Cole's neck and drank from him as he grabbed both their dicks together and stroked. As the younger man began to pass out, he caught him and tossed him on the bed.

"Remember what I said my love, have your fill and cover yourself in his blood for me."

Allison rubbed herself against his body as she licked the still gushing wound in his neck. She finished as his heart stopped pumping and kicked the body from her sheets and spread the blood all over herself provocatively.

"It's no wonder our Robert chose you. You are stunning. Both before and after your rebirth. I am glad I chose to let you live. Some things are just as sweet the second time around."

It was at the mention of the name Robert the memories flooded back to her. She was terrified but compelled to remain still as the man approached, stripping as he went. It was like part of her mind had detached from her body.  _How is this even possible?_ Her mind questioned but she then remembered how Robert had just sat there and looked on as this man had fucked her — as she had fucked him with a passion derived from his influence.  _Oh, God. I didn't almost die in labor. He cut out my baby! He made Robert watch!_

Her mind sobbed as her body laid back for him. As he licked her from toe to head and fucked her. And she remembered, but she couldn't run. She couldn't scream. She could simply be fucked. She could not prevent herself from fucking back or coming on his cock. Then he was off of her and the room went black as a single tear streamed down her blood stained cheek.

* * *

Cameron awoke from a fitful sleep. The vision of fucking House had unnerved her. She lay in bed staring at the ceiling wondering just what had happened. Getting pulled into his mind wasn't unusual. In fact, it was a regular occurrence over the past two years.

But this, this was different. It was —

A loud knock at her door pulled her from her thoughts. She sighed and shouted out a "Coming," as she sat up and swung her legs over the side of the bed. Clad in her black cami and loose pajama pants she made her way to the front of her apartment.

She opened the door and met a pair of blue eyes. House looked pensive and unsure of himself. "I'm not sure what's going on, but I'm... "

Cameron sighed and completed his sentence for him. "Remembering."

He gave a firm nod of his head. "I'm… This I don't know what's real. It's like there are different versions of the last 5 years of my life swirling around in my head. Please, Allison, I need you. I need someone to show me what's real. You're the only one who can. Somehow, I know that."

"Come sit at the kitchen table. I'll make us some coffee. I'm tired of this whole mess. I will help you remember, but you must still decide if you want to remain with your eyes wide open or if you will shut them again to the truth."

* * *

### Princeton, New Jersey. November 1st, 2014.

Allison sat with him in his room, waiting for him to wake up. A myriad of emotions coursed through her. Happiness he was not dead. Anger for what happened to him. Helplessness that she couldn't do more to restore his leg. Frustration because on top of everything his leg would make the whole processes far more challenging and, in her estimation, pull him toward choosing infection over a normal life. She couldn't guarantee his function would return 100% even after conversion. Old wounds were unpredictable. She supposes that it's new enough it would likely regenerate. Hell, depending on how the parasites may alter his DNA, there's a chance they could cut off his leg and it'd grow back a perfect copy. It was impossible to know. Too many variables. Too many questions still unanswered.

Of course, there was that part. The puzzle. She wishes they would have approached him with the puzzle alone and skipped the games they now played when deciding to convert. Let him form his own theories and opinions on the matter before risking bonding him to someone like Stacy.

In her heart, she knew that wouldn't have worked either. Being surrounded by the substance you're born addicted to would have ended much has it has now.

She wished Cuddy could do this part. But she knew, once he fully awoke, his memories would come flooding back and Cuddy would not be able to calm him. His logical mind would most likely scoff at it all, on top of everything else. He might not even choose to confide in Cuddy, choosing PTSD over any sort of admittance of what he knew had happened. When she told him she knew, there was no way of knowing how he'd take it. How his mind and emotions would cope.

No, this was damage control. It was her job. Figuring out a way to fix this, if it was even possible, was her responsibility alone. One thing she did know for sure. She was going to disclose everything and give him a choice. Allison was over this game. She'd been over it since she'd been the victim.

House stirred. Asked for water. She picked up a cup of water with a straw from the counter and placed the straw in his mouth. He drank. Though the anesthesia didn't take very long to wear off completely, morphine was also coursing through him. She knew without it he'd be in pain after waking, so she'd dosed him to prevent more shock.

"Have I ever told you how sexy you look in scrubs? I especially like that you left on the hat. Very hot."

She was momentarily taken aback with several strange sensations. She felt somewhat light headed so, she sat down and pulled her chair closer to his bed.

"I see you're feeling better."

House shook his head in the affirmative. "I feel great." He lifted his arm to inspect the I.V. then looked over to the pump's display to confirm what he already knew. "Which I can only assume is because I've got a steady flow of 10 mg of morphine coursing through me. It's pretty cool actually."

"Do you know why you are here?" She asked. Then wished she hadn't. Her mind was taken over by vivid imagery. Stacy. The bite. His reaction.

"I… uh. I don't…"

She willed herself to stay together. The onslaught of emotion she felt confirmed what she feared would happen had come to pass. They were bonded and now she had to fight her way through feeling his emotions and still project calm for both of them.

"Greg, you do know. I know you think you must be losing your mind. But, you're not. Stacy is what you'd most likely term a vampire. Although, that's definitely a fictionalized portrayal of the race of humanity we call prerojen or the reborn."

He wanted to protest, but she touched his arm and willed his heart beat slower and his mouth stay closed for a moment more. "Shh. I know. But it's important that you listen." He swallowed and nodded. He had a million questions swimming in his mind. She could hear them like the wind of a storm. She closed her eyes and breathed slowly.  _Breathe, House. Just breathe_. Her mind spoke to him and he began to calm.

"Stacy hurt you. She didn't mean too, but she pushed herself too far. In many ways, you pushed her too far without knowing. That's not your fault. That's her fault for not being honest with herself, and for that matter, you. But in her defense, that's the because of The Coalition. She was under an oath and orders. But she fell in love with you and that complicated everything." She felt more questions. This was going to be harder than she'd thought.

"It's a long story. One that starts long before you were born. Your logical mind isn't going to want to believe it, but I will preface the story with this: despite what you think you may know about the myth, prerogen don't suffer from some kind of supernatural curse. They are infected. The infection is parasitic. These parasites alter human DNA and turn on some long dormant traits which can seem superhuman.

"Our aging slows dramatically. We live very long lives. We recover from diseases and physical damage that would kill most humans. There are variations, but before man had the power to study this condition, many thought the reborn to be immortal, and so the popular term for the disease is The Immortality Contagion."

She felt more questions rising in his mind, she hushed him once again.

"They'll be plenty of time later to discuss it as doctors and scientists would. What's more important is for you to understand what has happened to you and what that means for you."

His mind finally rallied a protest that made it to his mouth. "This is ridiculous. Did Wilson put you up to this, because there's no way I'm falling for a prank involving vampires." This wasn't something he was going to accept at face value. Allison knew that. But she'd hoped to not have to reduce it to a parlor trick. Of course, he was a scientist so she would be able to present him both the hard evidence and show him some of her abilities that would seem like magic.

"No. Wilson doesn't know anything about this. Wilson still doesn't know you've been hurt. He's on vacation, remember?"

"That doesn't mean anything."

"House, I know you can see my aura. So you know I'm not lying." He looked at her with a mild shock, but then recovered. She knew what he was thinking before he said it. "Yes, I did read your file, but I didn't have to to know. I can see them as well. So can Stacy."

"Well, then Stacy must have been a class-A liar because her aura wasn't deceitful."

"She didn't have to be. When would you have ever asked her the right questions? And if you had, she would have either told you a more believable version of the truth than the whole truth or simply wiped your memory of it.

"I know it's going to take more than my words. But for more, I need you sober. But once you're sober, you're going to be in a lot of pain. You had a severe reaction to Stacy's bite. In fact, we've never seen anything like it. It went far beyond a normal rejection and a rejection normally involves blood transfer from infected to the uninfected. The bacteria in her saliva, which is produced by prerogen while feeding, should only serve to slow the clotting of blood. Hers reacted with your blood and ate into your flesh. Ate into your muscle. It was like seeing a shotgun wound that had gone untreated for weeks become rancid and gangrene."

He sat up and pulled the sheets off him and exposed his thigh. It was covered in thick gauze. "Take it off. I want to see. I remember she… She bit me. It was erotic at first but then the good pain turned to bad and I screamed. But she didn't stop. Then I don't remember anything. I assume I passed out. If what you say is true, then how do I even have a leg?"

She began unwrapping the bandage. "You have a leg because I gave you my blood. At least as much as I could without risk of infecting you. In fact, I wasn't sure it wouldn't, but thankfully you are not outside the norm in that regard. Unfortunately, given the extreme nature of the reaction, it was only enough for a half measure of healing. I still had to cut out a chunk of flesh and muscle about the size of my fist, because it was threatening to spread again and I couldn't risk a second transfusion."

"Why would your blood have anything to do with healing my leg? You said it would risk infecting me. So are you telling me you are also a vampire? That your blood can magically cure things? How is it that I'm not infected then?"

He inspected the wound. His face fell to see the reality of it. The morphine was doing its job and her blood was still affecting him.

"Because your body can fight off the upír parasites to a point. As the parasites die, they release hormones into the bloodstream that have many side effects. In some small way, they always alter the potential host, but not nearly to the extent of if they win the battle of survival. They allow your body to heal at an accelerated rate. They fight off other infections as they work to take over your system. It's like fighting fire with fire, in some ways. And just a dangerous."

"So I wake up missing a chunk of my leg. And I'm seriously supposed to believe that everyone's a fucking vampire, or prerogen or whatever the hell you want me to call you. This isn't really funny."

"It's not supposed to be. And no, I didn't expect you to believe it. Even though you know what you saw, the mind has protection mechanisms. It's way easier and safer to believe you dreamed this and somehow we found out and are playing a prank on you. Although, cutting out a chunk of your leg would be a very extreme prank."

"That's just it. It looks like hell, but it feels totally normal. I mean I know I'm on morphine, but it isn't just numb. It feels normal."

"Tomorrow, when the last of my blood is processed by your system, the pain will present. I am sorry, House."

She paused for a moment before continuing with a softer tone, "You'll also go through withdrawal from it. I'm sorry for that too."

His face fell and he rolled away from her. His mind was churning as he played with the idea that it all could be true. Cameron sighed. She knew she'd make no more progress tonight. She stood and placed a hand on his shoulder. "I'm going to leave you alone to process. Cuddy has assured me you'll have privacy here."

He shrugged off her hand like a child being punished and sent to bed. Without turning back over he asked, "I guess she's a vampire too? Right?"

Cameron smiled, knowing he was mostly joking. Though part of him really needed to hear the answer. "You've known her for twenty years. Has she aged in that time?"

"I suppose her breasts are bigger now than when we were kids. But they are as perky as ever."

"No. She's not prerojen. But she's lived amongst us her whole life. She has refused conversion. Wisely, I think."

"And where is Stacy? Why isn't she here with me? Why isn't she telling me all this?"

"Because she did tell you and you thought it was role play. And now that the damage is done, it's my job to tell you. I work in Damage Control. I make sure when things like this happen the world doesn't find out. If you were anyone else, if you weren't that important to us, you wouldn't even know what happened at this point. But you've been in the dark for too long. You deserve to know. Even if you forget it later."

He rolled back over, looked up to her and asked, "Why would I forget?"

Allison wasn't ready to answer that. The answer was far too long and complicated to explain now. "Stacy's in the waiting room. But, there's something you should know before you see her again."

"Go on," House conceded. Knowing he would get no more information on the topic.

Cameron sighed, trying to think of the best way to frame the next bit.  _How do you tell someone they are now emotionally bonded to you whether they want to be or not?_  She sat back down and took his hand. "There are side effects from consuming our blood. There are many factors at play, but when there is already a strong emotional connection, or perhaps more accurately, pheromone compatibility… consuming so much of my blood has likely bonded us. With the drugs in your system, it's hard for me to gauge how deeply. But your relationship with Stacy will change. And, given the obvious reaction you have to her bite, it would be insane for either of you to risk continuing as you did before.

"Even if this bond between us doesn't interfere with your emotional connection to her, it would be suicidal. Having tasted you once, she'll need to do it again. It's overwhelming and it's our nature."


	14. Toward the Light and Into the Shadows

### Atlanta, Georgia. October 14th, 2012

"It was much as you expected," Raphael informed his commander as they walked along the long park trail. The sun was setting behind the tree line and they both removed their sunglasses as they entered the shadowy lane.

"Go on," Tritter replied, as he placed his glasses in his suit jacket breast pocket.

Raphael had learned long ago that when Micheal sent him on a mission, there was always a reason. Many others in his position, with the smallest fraction of his experience, would have balked at the assignment. Men like them didn't bother themselves with matters like who's converting whom. Conversions, good and bad, had been happening since before recorded time.

Men like Raphael and Michael dealt with the war. The battle between the most powerful of their kind and all else in their wake. If Michael, or  _Tritter_  — he smirked inwardly at the odd name given to his commander in this life — had sent him, there was a reason.

Raphael found out much about Greg House's professional exploits by hacking into Cuddy's computer during his daily cleaning visits. He also serviced House's office and his lab. The rouge doctor was everything he'd heard. Brilliant and rebellious. But Raphael could see things in House's aura that most could not. It was those things that were far more important than his exploits.

"He has dark shadows."

The phenomenon's existence was not well known, even among the elders. Only a handful of them could even perceive dark shadows and those who could choose to keep the knowledge buried. This wasn't hard since so few could see them. Those who had heard of them simply dismissed them as another bit of exaggerated folklore.

Raphael had only encountered or heard of dark shadows in the auras of other prerojen. Even then it was most rare. Of those who had them, most were lovci — Powerful ones, at that. He knew of a handful of exceptional slepar with shadows in their aura. Having never met anyone who had them before their rebirth, he wasn't sure just how much he should be concerned by their appearance in this polovica. But given he'd seen just about all there is to see in his long lifetime, he was overly cautious of anything new he encountered.

"He also has pure clear whites."

Clear whites were just as rare and just as powerful. It spoke to a potential for greatness of self. The highest level of self-awareness could be obtained by those who's auras were laced with flares of clear whites. Self-awareness was the key to power. But how would House use that power if he unlocked it?

How could his gifts be exploited by those in power on either side if one day House were to be reborn?

Tritter nodded. He needed no explanation of what he knew. "The others?"

"They have no clue. There is some instinct buried so deeply none of them understand why the idea of converting him seems to warrant more caution than the run of the mill. He has enough surface issues it's easy to believe they are the reason for the questionable feelings in their guts."

Tritter smirked — his instincts on the matter confirmed. "And you? Do you believe he would be our savior or our curse as one reborn, or perhaps just another overly-cocky vampire?"

"That depends on if we are correct about the one who sired him — and, of course, in that case, one cannot discount the effect Allison Chase might have on him should she chose to take him from Stacy Miller. She has quite the interesting aura as well, especially when compared to Greg House."

"So she  _does_  want more than to mentor him?"

"Yes. She spends a great deal of effort controlling her urges around him. More than she's willing to admit to anyone, most of all, herself. They have a strong awareness of one other even now. Most would have acted by now, however, she's strong-willed for her age. But you know that."

* * *

### At a time and place unknown.

The man had been freed from the box and lay on a cold, hard table. He fed on the one who placed him there the first moment he found it in himself to move. He did not take note if they were male or female; if their skin was light or dark. The full light was so overwhelming he merely followed his nose.

After drinking his fill, he dropped the body and slowly the room come into focus. It was a lab of some sort. Many coffins were stacked around him. Some open. Some skeletal remains lay on metal examination beds. The equipment was in some ways familiar, yet far more refined than anything in his memory. His memory was no more than flashes — like an instinctual knowledge of the tools around him.

He wasn't sure why, but he knew he should not linger here. He needed to hide — find shelter and think. Calibrate.

His legs were stiff and protested moving at first. However, as the fresh blood began to work its way into his system he felt a warm sensation in both limbs. He wiggled toes first, then a calf. Then raised each knee an inch from the table. This caused an unpleasant sensation through his entire lower half. Like his legs had gone to sleep times a million. He opened his mouth to groan. Even that hurt, given he'd not used his vocal cords in an age. It came out almost like an infant's cry.

His hands grabbed at his legs. His hands and arms were the only things he'd moved for as long as he could remember. Of course, that movement was limited too. His arms already felt the strain from having grabbed his victim to feed. But at least there wasn't the feeling of a million pins and needles being stuck into their length, as was the case with his lower extremities.

Then there was the strange sensation of his dick hardening. He wasn't turned on. It just was following instinct. He'd fed on fresh blood. His body wanted — needed — more. So his dick was simply ready to work as it had been in his life before the box. He could only assume it was years. It had felt like hundreds of them. There was no way for him to know.

But, for the first time in as long as he could remember, he had thoughts other than his love fucking the devil. He felt a long-buried emotion.

Hope.

He felt another on it's back — the desire for revenge.

* * *

### Princeton, New Jersey. November 23rd, 2016.

They didn't get far into retrieving his memories before the withdrawal set in. He began to sweat. His body shivered. He looked a wreck. He began rubbing his leg and staring down at the floor. Allison wasn't one hundred percent sure what was wrong, but she had her suspicions given the evidence.

The vivid vision.

His near lack of a limp when he entered the apartment.

His memories surfacing.

"Are you okay?" She asked, as a way of garnering information. He obviously was not okay.

"No. I —," he stopped short, remembering his promise to keep the drug a secret. However, Allison could read his thoughts and it confirmed her fear.

"She gave you a drug," Allison stated simply. His head shot up in surprise "— your whore. She gave you something she shouldn't have because of the pain."

His eyes widened with the revelation. "How did you...?"

"Greg, we can feel each other's emotions, even when several miles apart. We can sometimes see what the other is thinking, project and even hear thoughts verbalized when one of us is focused on the other. Especially when in close proximity. If I can smell you, I can damn near fully read your mind as clearly as your aura. In fact, you can also read mine. You just don't know that you are.

"I know you see a woman named Ronda for the kind of sex you crave but can't get from most women, paid or not. The kind of sex you want from me. I know because I use the same service to serve my needs and I sent them to find you and lure you in without telling you so much. I wanted you to have a safe place to take care of your needs because I know how much it hurts. I hurt just as badly."

"Why?" He asked sadly. Still in pain. Still shaking, but now with raw emotion spilling from him. A few tears escaped his eyes and she raised her hands to his face and wiped his cheeks clean. So much meaning in that one word.

Why would you do that?

Why can't we just be together?

Why do you need to pay for sex, when I'd give it to you freely?

Why does it hurt so, so badly?

"Because I don't want to do to you what Stacy did, or worse. And you wisely refused conversion. If I were to hurt you more, I would likely do anything to save you, perhaps even convert you against both our better judgment. I don't want this life for you and before you had me rewrite your memories, you choose to refuse this life yourself."

He was confused. Some part of him knew she was telling him the truth, but he couldn't remember everything and what was in his head was all jumbled and just seemed wrong.

"Greg, you have no idea how much I wish we could be lovers. How much I would love to make you my bonded pijača. How much I crave you — in  _every_ way. But I love you too much to put you in that kind of danger. And so, I suffer. We both suffer, at the other's behest."

It was inevitable. The contact between them heated quickly. Before she could give him more detail, his mind silenced their reverie. The imagery of what he desired was overwhelming.

"House… Greg, I don't think we should—"

"Shh. Either I'm just going to forget it in a day or two or I'm going to deal with this once and for all. Either way, I want to feel what it's like to really be inside of you. If it's half as good as it is in our heads…"

"Please. I don't want to hurt you."

He shook his head fiercely. "All I ever do is hurt. You can't make me hurt more. You won't hurt me in the way you fear, because I won't let you. It was blood she gave me, wasn't it? Blood from a prerojen. Blood like yours. And it made me stronger. It's how they handle their  _other_ clients, isn't it? The clients like you?"

_Of course, he would figure it out with the least bit of knowledge_. He had just enough pieces of the puzzle placed. It was still risky, but he was right. Blood doping was indeed why most willing pijača stood a chance when things went too far. He was also a half-breed and there was a reason so many half-breeds were enlisted to serve as whores to her kind. They craved it, but they also were a more even match when under the influence of a few drops of prerojen blood.

But with the service, there was always an escort. A second half-breed or prerojen in the next room who could sense when things started going near the point of no return. With him, now, there would be no safety net.

However, she could no longer resist. His longing. His pain. His desire. All of him overwhelmed her. He felt the instant she caved in and it was all he needed. He spoke to her with his mind as if he'd been doing it of his free will for years.

_"You can't hurt me this way. Not if I drink from you and not with this bond. I can feel you. You can feel me. You won't take it too far. You know this. Please, Allison. Make it stop hurting. Make love to me. Fuck me. Make our pain end, if just for tonight."_

Her fangs dropped and she pulled her right forearm to her mouth piecing it with a gentle bite, releasing two small streams of blood. Then she extended her arm to him. He took her by the wrist and licked up the red droplets.

It was done and there was no going back.


	15. Once Bitten

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sorry for the wait. Lots of life going on these days. I did finally replace my stolen computer this week. I suppose that helps more than a little. Hopefully, you've not given up on me. It is a longer chapter too and full of smut, so hopefully, that makes things a little better. You're all the best! I would have given up completely if not for the reviews.

### Princeton, New Jersey. October 31st, 2014.

House leered at Stacy. She was laid out over their bed. He tugged at the collar of his Halloween costume. He'd gone as a priest telling Stacy that "the scariest thing anyone can be is a man of the cloth." Of course, he felt it also was the best compliment to the outfit he'd picked for her. He knew she would the moment he saw it on the rack of the Halloween store. Vampires were his favorite kind of slutty chicks. Maybe it was the blood fetish, but the idea of being seduced by a hot vampire chick had always made him hard as a rock. Even as a kid.

She scoffed at first. "I am not going to our work fundraiser as a slutty vampire." But he gave her his little boy look and she melted as always.

He'd had fun at the party, chasing her around, waving the rosary, with mock threats to burn the devil from her soul and save her. She laughed and took the beads from him, placing them around her own neck, allowing the cross to dangle between her exposed cleavage. "I think you're going to have to do better than that. Maybe you should try some holy water."

He laughed, "I know a hole that I can get something nice wet… to pour from. It's a sacred place. A holy, hole, one might say."

All night she'd tempted him at the party. Afterward, he was hard before they even walked in their front door. She didn't stop and the threshold, but lead the way to their bed and jumped in. Rolling over she looked up at him standing before her and raised an eyebrow. He was sexy as fuck, even as a priest. Maybe more so, because it seemed taboo.

After he was fully undressed, he smirked at her. She was lying there twirling his rosary one way and then the next around her index finger. In that position, her extremely short skirt didn't stand a chance of covering the red thong underneath, or the wet spot on it. "Have I ever told you that I have a thing for vamps. I think it's the fangs. Or maybe their close ties to the devil and all that is evil and fun." He waggled his eyebrows as he teased. "Whatever it is, something about them makes me hot." He approached the bed and crawled over her. He bent forward and captured her lips with his. She still tasted like wine.

Sighing she pulled back and looked him in eye. Now seemed as good a time as any to tell him. Even if he thought it was a joke, it would get the topic out there and she could make a path forward. "What if I told you that vampires were real. Though, they aren't the stuff from your fiction. What if I told you I was one of them."

House smiled devilishly, "I'd say bite me and make me bleed, then feast on me while you fuck me." He emphasized the last part by rubbing his shaft against her wet thong.

"I'm serious. You shouldn't joke that way. It has an effect on me whether I want it to or not." It had, in fact, made a surge of new wetness drip onto her already soaked panties, and a slightly unfamiliar tickle start on the roof of her mouth.

He felt the new surge of wetness and slid a finger in from the side of her underwear to feel it from the source. After soaking it, he lifted it to his mouth for a taste and stroked himself as he sucked. He fucking loved how she tasted. His cock agreed with his mouth. Smirking at her wanton reaction to his indulgence he rubbed himself against her again through the thin strip of red fabric. "I'm not joking. You know I want that. If I had known a little role play is all it would take to get it, I would have bought you the sexy vamp outfit years ago."

Taking a deep breath she focused. It was hard as his cock to do it, but she knew the next few moments were a crucial next step for her people. And, for her. For them. "What if I told you it wasn't a mystic curse of satan or anything supernatural at all. It is an infection, a disease that we only recently have begun to understand as such. That we think it can be treated perhaps even cured."

"I'd say 'why cure a good thing?' God, the thought of you biting me is so fucking hot. I'd say turn me and let's have hot vamp sex for the next 1000 years or so."

He wasn't making this easy. Then again he was a man of science and men of science need evidence. "I'm not allowed to  _turn_  you. We call it conversion, or infection, by the way. But I was instructed to include you because I think we can trust you. I trust you. Maybe one day we'll turn you but for now…"

"Oooh, let me guess! You hate killing people, so you need a willing human to let you feed. Fuck, that's so hot. I'm willing. I don't want you to have to kill the innocent, baby. Use me. Drink my blood. I trust you."

Her eyes flared as did her aura. House didn't understand the fire he was stoking, but the hotter it got the more he wanted her to taste him. He pinned her under him and licked her neck up to her ear, then bit her hard. "Use me. I know you must be hungry for me after all this time. I know you must wonder how I really taste. So taste me. I'm not afraid. I want it. I love you." She was humming under him.

Stacy was losing control. Maybe she should have waited until after her next transfusion. Maybe it wouldn't have mattered. All she knew was the more he begged for it, the more hungry she became. The more curious she was about what it would be like to feed in the old way. What he was offering, though in jest, was the norm for her kind.  _That's how Eric started with Remy. It's how most are still converted. Would it really be so bad to…_

She felt the sensation of her fangs dropping from behind her canines. Something she hadn't felt since she was first infected and woke up hungry and out of control. His scent amped in her nostrils next. She could hear his pulse. Her whole being was desperate to taste him. To feed. For quite some time she'd wondered what it would be like to bond with him. She knew he'd waste no time tasting her once she showed him she was willing. But he needed more than just a taste. She knew just the way to make him thirsty.

"Alright, Greg. You're so sure you want it. But I warn you once more this is no game. If we do this you'll likely become bonded to me and I to you."

"We're already bonded."

"I suppose we are, in a way. Look at me."

He raised up and looked down at her. His heart quickened. Her core color was steeped in purple. Her eyes flared with dark reds. He was at once physically calm and but his brain was questioning this shift in her aura. Something about it felt off. Dangerous even. And yet, his cock was as hard as he could ever remember it being. She smiled as she felt it twitch against her inner thigh and ran a finger along his neck.

His eye roamed over her face, her mouth."Are those fangs, behind your other teeth?" He asked. Still sure they were playing a game. How could they not be? However, he was very curious how she'd pulled that bit off. These looked so much more real than the ones from her costume. Quickly, he realized these weren't just new points on her canines, but instead a second set of sharper ones directly behind them.

"Yes. They retract. They only come out when we are stimulated to feed. I've never fed the traditional way before. Like we were intended to feed. I've been  _fed_  via blood transfusions since my conversion 28 years ago. Fed might even be a misleading term. We still have to eat like you. We need normal food. In so many ways we still are as human as you. But we lack something only human blood can give us. It's a side effect of the genetic mutation caused by the Immortality Contagion. Our stomach has a mutation which transfers blood we consume out to the bloodstream rather than into the intestines, acting much like a transfusion. There are bacteria hosted in our stomachs which prevent the normal digestive enzymes from destroying the blood in the process."

A normal man might still think they were playing but, House was a doctor. He tilted her mouth open and examined the strange new set of teeth set just behind her own. They weren't fake. His respiration accelerated. "You're not playing."

"No, Greg. I'm not."

It was then his instinct kicked in. Fear. He suddenly was afraid. Yet he couldn't flee. Something about her kept him there and before he knew it he was sliding into her. She met his hips with enthusiasm and flipped him over. His heart raced more yet he let her hold him down and ride him.

He wanted to run.

He wanted to fuck and be fucked.

Finally, his fear won out and he tried to push her away.

His panic set off a reaction in her that she couldn't control. She slammed him down and looked him in the eyes. "Stay. You've made me hungry." She commanded and slowly licked and nibbled her way down his body. He did as he was told. She broke the skin first on his last rib, left side. He moaned in pleasure and pain. She watched as a small set of drops seeped out. The smell was like nothing she'd ever experienced and she had to taste it.

She licked the trickle from his side and reveled in the taste of iron and the sweet/saltiness of the blood mixed with his sweat. "Fuck, Greg. You were right. I should have been tasting you from the beginning."

_They cheated me. Those fucking hypocrites. This is how we are meant to be. A willing lover to feed from._

If the frenzy hadn't already kicked in she might have noticed the ugly way the minor wound on his ribs began to discolor. Perhaps, it would have been enough of a warning signal she would have been able to see past mere desire and hunger. But she didn't even know the warning signs of what was happening to her, because she'd been sheltered from the experience.

* * *

### New Brunswick, New Jersey. November 23rd, 2016.

Stacy must have replayed that night over in her mind a million times. Especially on days she couldn't find sleep. She sighed heavily and turned her head to observe her current lover in sleeping in the bed beside her. Mark was like her. A new convert. The equivalent to a vampire test-tube baby.

After what happened with House, Eric had spent the next six months trying to understand what the hell had gone so horribly wrong. He'd easily forgiven her lack of control. That was far harder for her to accept than if he'd seemed disappointed. "You have still far exceeded our best hopes," he told her. "28 years is a wonderous step for the transfusion program. What is far more concerning is the reaction. Rejection of our blood is one thing, but this… This is something we've never even seen before. You had no way of knowing. None of us did. By all rights, your worst case should have ended in bonding, which is more of a professional violation than a concern for the program. And none would have faulted you that. The council was not blind to your love for him. They exploited it. Banked on it even."

Eric was known for his lack of enthusiasm for the spy-games side of the coalition's work. He was first and foremost a scientist. He understood the need, but he held fast to the idea that the solution to this constant cold war on the verge of melting was in medicine and science and not in conversion control. If he had his way, a man like Greg House would simply be invited to dinner, shown to the lab and if he freaked out too much simply taken back home with his memory jogged. If he didn't freak out, then he'd have the option of inclusion or perhaps a trip to his bed where he and Remy could demonstrate the fringe benefits of conversion.

Stacy laughed bitterly at that thought. Eric held his subjects to the highest of standards and yet, she knew it was only the scientist in him that cared if they failed or succeeded. He didn't have the same extent of moral objections of some others in their community — Like Allison Cameron. He did wish to end killing and the use of humans as some kind of brainwashed livestock-meets-sex-toy. But he enjoyed what he was. He enjoyed taking the well informed into his and Remy's bed and paying them for their blood in sexual delights unlike any they could get in their 'normal' world.

In the end, Eric had found that she and Mark carried a mutation that made them lethal to nearly any they might feed from. 99.8% chance he'd told them. 99.8% chance of a repeat of what happened with the love of her life. Mark and she had found some comfort together after being sent together for further study at the Rutgers' lab. She found she could talk to him in ways she couldn't anyone else. He was good for her in a way that Greg House had never been. For all House's passion and obvious love for her, he was hard-pressed to truly make her feel like she was the center of his universe as he had been hers. That passion was for his work alone.

And that passion is what he shared with Allison Cameron. Stacy still hated how jealous that made her. Still makes her. Mark loves her and puts her first. She was sure of that and she does love him. But the prize for runner-up never feels quite as good as it should. If only those bastards had offered House the new path to conversion before the reaction… before Cameron had treated him and imprinted her own moral compass on to him… before Cameron had to bond with him to save him.

If only she hadn't let House convince her to go to that damned party as a vampire. Allison had nearly torn her arm off pulling her aside that night

_"What the hell is this? You have to be kidding?"_

_"Greg bought it and brought it home this afternoon. Before that, I thought we weren't even coming. He said Cuddy was on the warpath about him ditching all the charity events and said she'd stick him in a classroom next semester if he didn't show. So he picked this up on his way home and told me 'When I saw this, it was suddenly worth losing.' How was I supposed to say no to that?"_

_"Simple. Say it. It's just one little syllable. You're a lawyer, you have way more than one in your arsenal. Fuck!" Allison cursed under her breath and sighed, "It can't be helped now. I got the message today." She knew she'd already pushed Stacy too hard and the walls were up, so it was best to change the subject. "When do you plan to talk to him?"_

_Stacy was thankful for the turn in the conversation. Allison had a way of making her feel like a little girl. "I'd hoped for tonight, but with this whole party thing… I guess I'll play it by ear. Sometime this weekend. I might need you to back me up after that. He'll need to see the upír parasite live and in person and not on a computer screen to be fully convinced. He'll never believe it until he sees it for himself. So whatever you need to do to make that happen, set it up for Monday morning. I'll let Cuddy know to give you the time."_

_"Sounds good," Allison gave a curt nod. "I'm glad they came to a decision. Finally! This has dragged on for far too long."_

_"Yes," she agreed. "I was worried when Tritter showed up and provoked him into a night at the local jail. But, I guess, Greg passed whatever final test he had for him. When I got the call I thought it was all over, but when I went in to pick up Greg, Tritter pulled me aside and gave me the go ahead." However, now that the moment was at hand, it was making her as nervous as she was relieved to be nearing resolution. "I fear he'll be angry with me when he knows the full story."_

_Allison placed her hand gently on Stacy's arm. "Perhaps, but he does love you and he reads you. If he does feel betrayed, it will pass when his mind becomes consumed with the ultimate puzzle. Then, he'll love you for it."_

_"I hope," Stacy spoke nearly in a whisper and looked to the ground. After taking a deep breath she continued. "Look, I know it's not always… I know we don't always see eye to eye, but I do respect you, Allison. So, thank you for that. I sometimes need to be reassured when he's being House and not Greg."_

_Though she meant the words, her innermost fear that night was how things would change once he got his new puzzle. Allison would be transferred to his lab. She would work with him and show him something that he would crave and obsess over and love. She would share those moments in his life that he held most essential. Territory Stacy could not traverse._

_When he was ready, he would be asked to move to Atlanta, where she and he could be away from Allison. But until then…_

Looking back now, she wished she'd not figured out how to hide fear and jealousy from Allison. That night, it might have saved all of them. Instead, it just helped push her toward the worst moment in her life.

* * *

### Princeton, New Jersey. November 23rd, 2016.

House licked Cameron's arm again, then sucked on the wound to extract more blood. Cameron moaned. She'd never let a lover drink from her since her rebirth. Truth be told, she'd not 'let' a lover before. It simply was done to her by her once husband. The thought of doing this had never felt right. However, now having given in, she couldn't think of something feeling more natural. Houses aura began putting on a display of bright colors, unlike anything she'd ever seen before.

Of course, he was turned on, but beyond that was pure satisfaction in this act. Somehow knowing the moment he should drink no more, his tongue blazed a trail up her arm. But the table corner was too much in the way. He stopped and looked her in the eye, "I'm torn. Part of me wants to push everything off this table and fuck you, hard and relentlessly on it. Part of me really wants our first time to be slow."

She regarded him seriously, "I've spent the last 150 years having sex out of a need beyond love. In that time, I've only made love a handful of times. And all of those were before you were born."

His heart felt for her, but his mouth chose its normal sarcastic path to comfort her. He knew platitudes were useless anyway. "God, that's so fucking kinky. And somehow, really hot. I guess I have a thing for older women."

"Must. C'mon, let's go to bed."

She stood up and offered her hand to him. As he took it he noted that her wound looked to be a day old. "Damn. That's fast."

"You get used to it."

She tugged again and he stood up. His pained expression gone now that his system was dosed again. "I could get used to this," he said as he stood with no pain. Both his legs felt strong and his cock throbbed at the thought of what that meant. With a smirk, he grabbed her and tossed her over his shoulder.

She yelped like a little girl. She hadn't been manhandled in more than 150 years either. It was fun. "House! What on earth are you doing," she mock-protested. "Put me down, or I'm gonna make you pay!" She kicked at the air and hit on his back with her fists.

"Promises, promises, Cameron. But if you do that, there's gonna have to be a raincheck on the making love portion of our sexual escapades this evening.

"Is Cameron even your name?" He asked with a slap on her butt and started carrying her toward the bedroom.

She yelped again and giggled, "As much as any I've had, I actually have grown rather attached to this name over the others. I was married twice before I was infected, so I suppose I was used to changing it anyway. We keep our old name on our internal records, but for the sake of keeping things straight, at the Coalition we all use each other's current surname. Largely, most of us keep our first names for much longer, just depends on if they are common enough to work in our next life or if we want a change. I've yet to change mine."

"You were married twice?" He asked as he reached the bedroom doorway. Spying her large king sized bed put an even bigger smile on his face.

"Yeah. My first husband died fighting for the U.S. Army in the Civil War. My second… well, he's the one who infected me. I don't know what became of him and I've long since stopped caring."

He tossed her down on the bed and began removing his shirt. "So what you're saying is that you might still be married. Also, kinda hot. A widow and an adulteress. Very progressive for your age."

"I suppose I always felt that marriage ended with my first life. I've legally died about 20 times now. That has to count somehow," she joked back as she pulled her cami over her head to reveal her breasts to him.

"Fucking spectacular. God, I love perky little boobs," he said while staring at them in a way that suggested viewing her breasts had lowed his I.Q. to somewhere below 90. She smiled, feeling his appreciation as much as she could see the clear reds in his aura flare hotter by the second.

"I think you should come here and show me how much," she patted beside herself on the bed.

"Oh, I plan too. But first, take off your pants. I want you naked."

He unzipped his own pants as she slid hers down her long legs and kicked them to the floor. She sat back on the bed one leg bent, posing on her elbows like a Playboy pin-up. As he slid his own pants down over his hips, his cock sprang out. It bobbed as he toed off his shoes and danced out of his pants.

Allison thoroughly enjoyed the display. His cock was as sexy as she'd imagined. With a smile, she told him as much. "Fucking spectacular. God, I love a perky big cock."

"I can't wait to let you show me how much," he smiled in a way she hadn't seen in more than two years and crawled onto the bed and over her. She spread her legs as he did, letting him settle between them. She could feel the lubrication from his cock on the inside of her thigh as she wrapped her legs around his.

"I bet, at your age, you know exactly what to do with one. I'll do my best to keep up, but feel free to train me. I've always wanted to be a cub to a hot cougar."

He lowered his head and kissed her. She kissed back for a moment then broke the kiss to bite at his ear. "I like your idea of making love. It's not boring or gushy."

"Allison, I don't think there is a situation in any universe in the multiverse that having any kind of sex between us could come out boring. Gushing on the other hand… we'll see." With that statement, he worked his way down her neck, biting and sucking more gently than he could remember being with anyone.

He could feel her pulse quicken as if it were somehow inside of him parallel to his own. Her every reaction felt as if he were experiencing it with her. It was nearly overwhelming, and so he moved even more slowly. "Oh, fuck… House, Greg… It's sooooooh ohh," she couldn't finish the thought as he took his first suck on her right breast.

Letting it go with a little pop he agreed with her assessment, "Yeah. I might come on your leg like a high school virgin."

"No, you won't. I can feel your control. You have far more than you like to admit," she said, suddenly serious.

"One could say the same of you." He raised an eyebrow, noting that nothing about this encounter seemed to warrant the fear of losing control she'd always held when it came to sex with him. Her other darker hungers seemed sated. "Enough business talk. I need boobs in my mouth." He didn't want to think about it. He didn't dare dwell on any thought that might scare her off. She'd know the instant he did. He'd rather project his desire to bite her tit.

"Yes. Please," she answered to the mental image.

_What else,_ his mind called to hers,  _Show me what you want me to do. I want to feel it when you come._

Allison projected one of her favorite fantasies of him teasing her slit with the tip of his cock. Working her and lubing them both until she was dripping. Then slowly sinking into her centimeter by centimeter until she was full. Then fucking her fast and hard until her whole body was rocked in orgasm. Often times, more than once. She'd played it out with her dildo many times.

That made him smirk. "Fuck, I want to watch that sometime."

He didn't waste time. His head dipped to her left breast and he sucked it to a long hard peak. Then he bit it. Slowly and softly at first, and as her hips raised in response, he pressed harder until the now familiar taste of iron moved across his tongue. She grabbed his hair and yelped. Then moaned out "Fuck, yes."

"Yeah, your silicon friend can't do that, can he?" He teased and sucked again as she rocked her hips. Her pussy grazed against his pelvic bone. She was slick and wanton.

House sat up on his calves. "Toss me those pillows," he commanded. She grabbed one after the other and tossed them his way. Folding and stacking them, he ordered her again " Lift your ass up, so I can prop your pretty little pussy up higher."

She pulled her legs back and planted her feet to the bed and lifted her ass as if she were doing a bridge pose in yoga. He brushed his fingers over the soft triangle of curls just above her vulva. "Fuck, me. You're so fucking sexy. Just like I've always pictured you. I love you've left some hair. I mean, I like pussy just about however it comes…"

"You should have seen it century-before-last. I didn't have to deal with shaving, trimming, or waxing anything at all. So much easier."

"I'd still fuck you, even if I wouldn't want to see you in a bikini that way," he winked and she rolled her eyes.

"Good to know, although that thing about the sun — we don't quite turn to dust, but we are extremely sensitive to it. So, we don't typically do the beach."

He ran a finger the length of her slit, then raised it to his mouth to lick his fingertip clean. He closed his eyes and savored her flavor. "I love eating pussy. I've dreamt about your pussy being on my face so many times and it always makes me come hard. But you requested my dick have the pleasure of first contact, so we'll have to save it for later."

With a chaste kiss to the apex of her slit, he rose to his knees and began stroking her outer labia with the tip of his penis. Then, he rubbed the length of his shaft between her wet lips and over the sensitive folds between. Both hummed with the combined sensations. She was already so wet, it didn't take long for him to be fully coated as well. His cock teased her entrance for a moment before he pushed forward slowly.

"God, you're so hot inside! It feels…"

He realized he didn't need to verbalize the sensation. She could feel it. He could feel her reaction to being spread open and filled by him. The feeling of completion when he could push in no farther. The hot white of her aura spoke to how close she already was to coming. He grabbed both her legs and pulled them up his body and wrapped her ankles around his neck. Grabbing her hips next, he began to plow into her as hard and fast as he could move. With the high from her blood, it seemed no real physical effort. His whole being could simply concentrate on the feeling of fucking her. How tightly she was squeezing him, how her body convulsed when she came again and again, and finally the explosion of pure pleasure as he came deep inside her.


	16. Truths Stranger than Lies

### Princeton, New Jersey. November 3rd, 2014.

House stared at the drop-ceiling of his hospital room. There was a stain that looked a bit like Conan O'Brien just to the left of the reminder to patients to call a nurse for help walking which was painted onto the ceiling, above the beds in all the rooms. He was reminded of his youth. His room in his home from ages 10-12 on the base in Quantico Virginia had many similar water stains. He'd often imagined great adventures were had by each character the stains conjured up in his imagination.

He had too many crazy stories in his real life to now consider creating anything more fantastic.  _Fucking vampires. Or prerojen or whatever the hell they want to be called._

All three women had spent time with him yesterday. All three gave him the story from a different angle. At least they didn't tell him prerogen were magical or supernatural. In fact, he found Camron's explanation of their disease and it's side effects to be extraordinarily fascinating and he wanted to know more. Her explanation of auras, in particular, had shed light on one of the biggest mysteries of his own life. The sixth sense he had was more than his gut or even his observation skills. It was simply genetics.

_"So you're saying you can basically brainwash anyone into believing anything. Sure thing Professor X," House scoffed at Cameron's explanation of how prerogen have kept their existence undercover for millennia._

_Sitting on the side of his bed, Cameron answered him calmly. "No, I'm not saying that at all. Let me start again. I suppose I should have started with the science version first with you anyway, but I'm in a habit of telling the layman's version."_

_He clapped his hands together and rubbed them vigorously, "Oh, goodie! Vampire science. I'm all ears."_

_Patience was on virtue she had in spades, and she was going to need it all by the looks of things. House was more than a little challenging today. She could feel his pain levels had increased and he had already maxed out is allotment of morphine for the evening._

_"It's good that you mentioned Professor X," she continued evenly, "because in many ways we are more like the X-men than perhaps we are like vampires. Our abilities, our lifespan, our drive to feed are all the result of genetic mutations caused by our parasitic infection._

_"Most of our "brainwashing" ability is possible because of pheromones. Prerojen produce more of them and are more sensitive to them. Most humans find us to be exactly whatever it is we project at that moment because they pick up on our pheromones and their bodies react in kind. If we are calm, they are calm, if we are aroused they become aroused, if we want to feed they want to be fed from. There are techniques that we are taught, that have been honed our elders for ages, to help us learn to control our reactions and in turn, our pheromone production. Elder prerojen can typically project a calming pheromone constantly. Instinctually, we project the same pheromone just before we begin feeding._

_"Pheromones, being what they are, can and will be more or less compatible between different people. Just like with uninfected humans, some people seem attractive to just about everyone they encounter. More charismatic, or in reality, they smell great to everyone. Some people seem immune to that same charisma because there are always outliers in the pheromone matchup game."_

_House was beginning to latch on and she could see his curiosity start to overtake his anger as his area shifted from a murky mix of greens, blues, and dark reds, to bright oranges._

_"For instance, people in damage control, like me, have what you might call a trustable aura. Most people react favorably to our pheromones and therefore are easy for us to calm. If we can make them calm they will trust us and become open to suggestion. So long as the suggestion is minor it's fairly easy to make it stick. More detailed memories can be replaced if the suggestion is more believable than reality. Given just about anyone would rather believe that vampires don't exist, there are always ways to reframe events that the mind would rather not believe._

_"As you know, normal humans can do this to a degree with one another. Like when you have a trusted lover or friend convince you someone's out to get you because they don't like that someone. Or maybe convince you something bad in your life wasn't so bad. But our added dose of pheromones made it a simple matter for us. The hardest part is weaving the lie. Some are naturals and the rest of us have years to practice and master that art."_

_He smirked at that, sensing she, unlike him, was definitely the latter. He was born able to craft a great lie._

_She smiled at this. Remembering the many times she'd been witness to his art in practice. But reminiscing would have to wait. She had more work to do. "Have you ever wondered why you see auras?"_

_He nodded, remembering exactly when that whole mess started. "Acid side effects from a trip back in college, in '95. I've often thought it was laced with ex. Because it felt more like a candy flip."_

_"No. Your trip, if it was acid or ecstasy at all, most likely triggered the visualizations. Knowing what I know about you and your gifts they most likely would have surfaced anyway. You could have also been given a dose laced with infected blood. Just like I mentioned before, in small doses, your body can fight off the parasites from our blood and as they die, they release a hormone which affects humans in a similar way as ecstasy. For half-breeds, it also has some acid like psychedelic effects because you have some receptors that most humans don't._

_"Seeing auras is normal for our kind. We are seeing pheromones in color, projected visually by our minds as an aura. Visual synaesthesia. It's like being able to see people's emotions, but really what is happening is two-fold: we have a stronger natural awareness of pheromonal responses and those receptors trigger a response in the visual cortex. All infected have this mutation. Many like you, who are the offspring of an infected father, also inherit this mutation and some, like you, fully see auras. Over time mature prerogen can develop extreme control over how others perceive them and how they perceived others. Basically, control their pheromone production at will._

_"And, of course, there are even stronger bonding pheromones that happen with greater degrees of physical contact. I'm sure you can continue to connect the dots since you are a doctor and are well aware of how pheromones work."_

_He rolled his eyes, but she knew he was nowhere near bored. 'Why do you do that?' She asked him in her mind and he shrugged before his eyes grew wide with the realization her voice had only been in his head. Yet, he knew it was her, and not his own mind. She smiled back at his thoughts and continued._

_"We also have a degree of ESP. It's not nearly as glamorous as fiction makes it out to be or as powerful. We can't, for instance, move an object with thought, or predict the future. It's more confined to the realms of intuition, telepathy, and retrocognition. We still don't fully understand how it works. We do know it's amplitude is tied to the pheromone equation. With most humans, if they have a strong emotional response to something, they emote it and when they do near me I can see some mental flashes, almost like a fleeting memory._

_"For those who are bonded, they can sometimes read one another's thoughts to a degree. And even over great distance will still experience flashes of emotion or mental imagery. Long distance mental connections are one of the parts we have yet to find the science behind. But like most things, we have a team who studies it so that one day we will."_

Tonight, if he was feeling up to it, she promised to show him the upír parasite in the lab. That he was very keen on seeing. But the whole mess being an interesting puzzle didn't make him any less pissed off at what they'd done. What Stacy especially had done. He had loved her. He still did love her. But the fucked up thing was it didn't matter because all he could think of was how pissed he was at her. Not to mention the impossibility of them ever being able to move forward given the reaction her bite. He didn't have a death wish.

And of course, now there was the amplified connection he felt with Cameron. If she was anywhere near him his whole being ached to join with her. He also felt her guilt in overwhelming waves and he found that he couldn't find it in himself to be pissed at her for what she'd done. Knowing she'd violated her own moral code deeply to save him, somehow made him that much more intrigued by her.

She insisted that his lack of anger was a side effect. He disagreed. He'd asked her if other bonded people lacked any animosity. The question left her back peddling for an answer he'd buy.

In fact, he completely understood the reasoning for evaluating him in secret. And yet he hated Stacy and Cuddy for the method.

He considered the whole of his life for the last three years. Tried to imagine how he would feel now had the bite not occurred, but instead, he'd listened and let Stacy simply inform him of the truth. Toyed with the idea of what it would mean to join them — to maybe even allow himself to be infected with the Immortality Contagion.

Life nearly immortal did seem like a pretty huge upside. However, Cameron's fears on the matter were as clear as if they were his own. That gave him pause.

He had talked to Cuddy at length about the work being done at the CDC. He more than enjoyed the idea of the puzzle. But he was still pissed as fuck that she'd withheld the information about what he was for nearly their entire friendship. She'd known since the first time he'd met the woman he'd been told was her sister, whom he now knew was her mother.

Cuddy signed him up to be tested like a lab rat. Let him fall in love with the person who was testing him. Not even a hint. Not one damned hint that he was being evaluated. Right down to his sexual habits. Right down to his heart. Evaluated for inclusion in something that would alter his life in ways he still had trouble comprehending.

And Stacy.

He knew she was in love with him. That's what made the whole thing even more savage.

He could accept it more easily if she wasn't — if she'd stayed his fuck buddy. But she'd moved in. She'd talked about their futures together. There were so many moments she'd twisted the truth of her nature and he'd fallen for all of it. One memory, in particular, stood out to him. He remembered the moment he'd realized that she never had periods. He'd assumed it was her birth control so, curious as he was, he'd asked her what birth control she was on.

Her answer was none. She shared she didn't have periods and couldn't have children because of 'early menopause'. Turns out there was nothing early about it. She could have children his age if she'd had children before her conversion. Though he'd never wanted kids, he'd felt sorry for her because she could never be a mother. He'd kissed her softly; felt bad for her because he thought a random roll of the genetic dice had taken the choice of becoming a mother from her.

He'd even felt a little pissed that it'd perhaps taken away his chance to change his mind on the topic. He didn't think he would but still, he hated to be told he can't.

_Fucking rich shit there,_ he grunted at the memory. For three years they settled into the idea of growing old together, all the while she neglected to mention the drastic difference in her version of growing old together and his.

And dammit, so many things between her and Cameron made sense now! He'd overheard more than one awkward conversation from just outside of Stacy's office door. But without the context, he'd chalked it up to the puzzle that was Cameron. Now he knew, that though she'd never told him, she'd pushed Stacy to keep the relationship from deepening. Warned her of getting too entangled.

He'd thought at the time she was warning Stacy that he was the kind of guy that would hurt her. And, at the time, he was bothered that Cameron felt that way. But he also projected being an arrogant, misogynistic, asshole to her and everyone else. Stacy was one of the few people he'd let know his real self. In fact, it had bothered him so much he'd started to be less shitty to Cameron than other people. He wanted her to like him, even before this whole bonding business.

"Greg?" A familiar voice called to him, drawing him out of his revery.

"Hey, Mom. I guess Lisa called you?"

The older woman simply nodded and walked to his bedside. A large cream-colored padded chair flanked the bed. She pulled it up nearer the bed and sat, reached out and took his hand in hers. "Your father wanted to…"

"Mom, don't. Just don't."

"Okay. I won't. How are you holding up?"

"Me? I'm just peachy. Gonna have a cool scare that all the babes will love and, if I'm lucky, I'll get upgraded from a wheelchair to a sexy cane. Chicks are gonna dig it."

"Oh, Greg, honey. Stacy loves you and other chicks  _will_  still dig you. You're very diggable."

He looked away sadly, already at the limit of how well he could be his normal sarcastic self with his mother. "Mom, Stacy and I... "

"Hush, now." She extended her hand to smooth his messy hard. "I know what she did. And I know it's hard to accept it now, but consider she did what she did out of love. She didn't want to lose you. This whole thing will pass and you'll work it out. She's the only one you brought home in 38 years. I know you. That means she's the one."

"Was."

He jerked his head away and she pulled back, seeing he'd reached his limit for accepting her physical affections. Sighing and placing her hand back on his she told him to "Give it time."

Oh how much he wished he could tell her the full story. But he wasn't even going to try. Seemed like it would be a terrible idea, all things considered. "Some wounds need more than time, Mom." He turned and looked her in the eye then. "And some will never heal."

Blue-green eyes met his look with a pang of great sadness. He had his idea why. He wasn't his father's son. He'd suspected it most his life, now he knew it. She knew it. John House fucking knew it. Whether he would admit it or not, his actions showed it. Greg House was a daily reminder of John's own failures.

House didn't know the details of how he came to be. Both his parents never wavered from the message that John is his father. But, House had always had suspicions that his mother didn't just have a simple affair. Hell, she may not even remember. Her memories might have been overwritten with suggestion. But somehow he doubted it was overwritten in full. There was too much melancholy in the way she sometimes looked at him. Too much dark blue in her aura.

He was glad in those moments that his appearance took after her side of the family. He looked much like his uncle, her older brother. So much so that one summer, when he'd spent a month with his uncle's family, he was always assumed to be another of their sons. The things that didn't match his mother's side were his blue eyes, but John had blue eyes and because of this, no one questioned if he was John's. Momma's looks and his father's eyes, he'd been told by his grandmother's and aunts. Father's eyes, was probably right. John just also happened to share the color.

But House knew that John knew and he dealt with it because he did love his wife and admitting the truth would have devastated her and demeaned John. Of course, being the kind of honest person John was, he resented his 'son' for forcing him to live a lie. His 'son' was the embodiment of John's dishonor and he couldn't help but project that feeling every moment he came in contact with Greg. If Greg House had inherited his looks from the fucking vampire that had raped his mother, John House might not have stopped short in his abuse.

"Hey, where'd you go?" His mother asked. His thoughts had carried him away, as they often did.

"Nowhere. It's not important. I — " He felt Cameron's approach before he saw her.

"Hey there," she interrupted from the doorway. "I was just about to start my shift, but I wanted to see how you're doing first. I'll not keep you from your company for long."

Blythe greeted Cameron warmly, "Oh, honey, you're fine. I've got nowhere to be but here. Take your time. I'm Blythe by the way. Greg's mother." She stood and extended a hand to Cameron.

Cameron had felt this already. "I'm happy he's got you here to look after him." She closed the gap between them and introduced herself while reaching out to shake Blythe's outstretched hand. "I'm Dr. Allison Cam—"

Their hands locked and Cameron's voice hitched. She was flooded with cold and terrifying energy. Intense imagery engulfed her mind. Being grabbed. The sound of clothing ripping. Pain. Pain all over. And, perhaps the most disturbing of all, she heard a once familiar voice speak her name "Allison…".

Both women pulled back as if the other was made of fire, but it was House who broke the silence in a breathless and shocked voice. "Cameron… What the fuck was that?!"


End file.
